One step further to the right. Right-wing extremism in Greece and the rise of Golden Dawn

One step further to the right

Right-wing extremism in Greece and

the rise of Golden Dawn

Birgitta Hsiu Lan Lim Ersland

Master’s thesis in Peace and Conflict Studies

Department of Archaeology, Conservation and History

UNIVERSITY OF OSLO

15.05.2014

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The Golden Dawn isn’t a story that began last year. The “men and women in the black shirts”

were always near you, they lived among you, for many years. Some of you wouldn’t take

them seriously, some of you were comforted in your bourgeois dream, but we said that our

time would come, our age still hasn’t begun, because we aren’t the quiet birds of peacetime,

we are birds of the storm and the hurricane. The storm came and the hurricane came and with

them we came – we, the “men and women in the black shirts”. In these pages, you will read

part of our story…

– Golden Dawn International Newsroom, 2014.

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© Birgitta Hsiu Lan Lim Ersland

2014

One step further to the right.

Right-wing extremism in Greece and the rise of Golden Dawn.

Birgitta Hsiu Lan Lim Ersland

http://www.duo.uio.no

Print: Reprosentralen, University of Oslo

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Loans make people slaves.

– Menander, Greek philosopher, 341/2–290 B.C.

[T]he pessimism of indignation […] Here the claim is made to judge history, to divest it of its

fatality, to discover responsibility behind it, guilty men in it. For this is the rub, one needs

guilty men. The underprivileged, the decadents of all kinds […] need victims […] To this end,

they need an appearance of justice, […] some sort of scapegoat. This scapegoat can be God

[…] or the social order, or education and training, or the Jews, or the nobility, or those who

have turned out well in any way. In short, the pessimism of indignation invents responsibility

in order to create a pleasant feeling for itself – revenge – ‘Sweeter than honey’ old Homer

called it.

– Friedrich Nietzche, The Will to Power, New York: Vintage, 1967:201–2.

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Abstract

This thesis examines the rise of the extreme right party Golden Dawn in Greece. The

main argument is that it is necessary to understand the developments of the modern

Greek state, from independence and throughout the financial crisis, to understand that

there is a general tendency in Greece to lean towards the far right in times of crisis.

Recent developments in Greece should therefore not be seen as a unique phenomenon,

but rather as a confirmation of the importance of nationalism, the effects of populism,

and also the heritage of fascism in contemporary Greece. The first part of this thesis

therefore looks at the history of Greece from 1821 to 1990 before moving on to a

larger discussion on developments from the 1990s. Particular attention will be given

to the period from the financial crisis of 2008 up until this day (early May 2014).

This thesis also looks at the concepts of nationalism, fascism and populism, and how

they are crucial both in defining the concept of the extreme right and for

understanding extreme right-wing parties.

Key words: fascism, Golden Dawn, Greece, nationalism, populism, right-wing

extremism, the extreme right, the far right, the financial crisis.

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Acknowledgments

First, I would like to thank my parents, and especially my father for nourishing my

interest in history at an early age.

Second, my supervisor, Dag Einar Thorsen, deserves a loud applause. You have led

me through this with a firm hand and have been a true inspiration. Thank you.

Third, to Mari. You are my best friend and I am forever grateful for our friendship.

Fourth, my dear fellow Pecosians. You know who you are. I never thought

complaining about our theses could be so much fun. Thanks to Pausegjengen for

providing me with enough to laugh about in the ninth floor reading room.

Fifth, thanks to Dr Vemund Aarbakke at the University of Thessaloniki, and to Nina

Biering Alexidis who have looked at some of the translations.

Finally, thanks to the Votsala family. My time in Lesvos has been an inspiration.

Thanks to Janet for making the best frappé in all of Greece.

In memory of Stratis Alexidis. I never got to tell you that it was our conversation that

early evening in Mytilíni that inspired me to write this thesis. I regret that we never

got to know each other as well as I would have liked.

Any faults or errors in this thesis are entirely my own.

Thermi, Lesvos, 16.04.2014

Blindern, Oslo, 15.05.2014

Birgitta Lim Ersland

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Abbreviations

ANEL Independent Greeks (Anexártitoi Éllines)

EAM National Liberation Front (Ethnikó Apeleftherotikó Métopo)

EDES National Republican Hellenic League (Ethnikós Dimokratikós

Ellinikós Síndesmos)

ELAS Greek People’s Liberation Army (Ellinikós Laïkós

Apeleftherotikós Stratós)

EPEK National Progressive Centre Union (Ethnikí Proodeftikí Enosis

Kéntru)

EPEN National Political Union (Kómma ton Proofeftikon)

DIMAR Democratic Left (Dimokratikí Aristerá)

KKE The Greek Communist Party (Kommunistikó Kómma Elládas)

LAOS Popular Orthodox Rally (Laïkós Orthódoxos Synagermós)

ND New Democracy (Neá Dimokratía)

PASOK Panhellenic Socialist Movement (Panellínio Sosialistikó Kínima)

SYRIZA Coalition of the Radical Left (Synaspismós Rizospastikís

Aristerás - Enotikó Koinonikó Métopo)

XA Golden Dawn (Chrysí Avgí)

EMU European Monetary Union

EU European Union, as well as its predecessor the European

Community

IMF International Monetary Fund

MTFS Medium Term Fiscal Strategy 2013-2016

MYPLACE Memory, Youth, Political Legacy And Civic Engagement.

A collaborative large-scale project funded by the European

Commission.

HRW Human Rights Watch

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Table of contents ABSTRACT ........................................................................................................................................ VII  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ..................................................................................................................... IX  ABBREVIATIONS ............................................................................................................................... XI  TABLE OF CONTENTS ................................................................................................................... XIII  1   INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................................... 1  

RESEARCH QUESTION .......................................................................................................................... 3  BACKGROUND ..................................................................................................................................... 4  

A short introduction to the history of Greece, 1821–2014 ............................................................. 4  Golden Dawn and the situation in Greece today ........................................................................... 5  

METHODOLOGY .................................................................................................................................. 6  A historian’s perspective ................................................................................................................ 7  Research design .............................................................................................................................. 8  Bias in historical explanation ......................................................................................................... 9  Challenges regarding the use of secondary literature ................................................................. 10  

THE FOLLOWING CHAPTERS .............................................................................................................. 12  2   THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK: EXTREMISM FROM THE MARGINS TO THE MAINSTREAM ................................................................................................................................... 13  

SUPPORTING CONCEPTS .................................................................................................................... 13  Nationalism ................................................................................................................................... 14  Fascism ......................................................................................................................................... 17  Populism ....................................................................................................................................... 24  

THE EXTREME RIGHT FAMILY: THE POPULIST RADICAL RIGHT VS. THE EXTREME RIGHT ............... 26  Klaus von Beyme and the ‘familles spirituelles’ .......................................................................... 26  ‘Radicalism’, ‘extremism’ and ‘populism’ .................................................................................. 27  

DEFINING THE EXTREME RIGHT ........................................................................................................ 29  3   1821–1949: SHAPING MODERN GREECE ............................................................................. 34  

1821–1923: THE BUILDING OF NATION AND NATIONALITY .............................................................. 34  From independence to the First World War ................................................................................. 34  From the Treaty of Sèvres to the Greek-Turkish War .................................................................. 35  From the Treaty of Lausanne to the Second Hellenic Republic ................................................... 37  

1924–1949: INSTABILITY, WAR AND MILITARY DICTATORSHIP ....................................................... 39  From the Second Hellenic Republic to the ‘Regime of the Fourth of August’ ............................. 39  The Second World War: the ‘long night of barbarism’ ................................................................ 42  The Greek Civil War ..................................................................................................................... 45  

GREEK NATIONALISM AND THE MEGALI IDEA, 1821-1949 ............................................................... 49  Nationalism and identity ............................................................................................................... 49  The Megali Idea ............................................................................................................................ 50  Cleavages in politics ..................................................................................................................... 51  

4   1949–1990: EUROPEAN INTEGRATION ................................................................................ 53  1949–1974: RECONSTRUCTION AND COUP D’ÉTAT .......................................................................... 53  

Foreign relations and the case of Cyprus .................................................................................... 53  From reconstruction to revolution ............................................................................................... 54  Coup d’état: The military Junta ................................................................................................... 57  

1975–1990: THE METAPOLITEFSI AND TWO-PARTY POLITICS ........................................................... 59  Rebuilding democracy .................................................................................................................. 59  New Democracy vs. PASOK ......................................................................................................... 60  Cyprus towards the new millenium .............................................................................................. 63  The Greek electoral system .......................................................................................................... 63  

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5   1990–2014: THE FINANCIAL CRISIS ...................................................................................... 65  THE QUESTION OF MACEDONIA ........................................................................................................ 65  NEW LEADERSHIP IN PASOK ........................................................................................................... 66  THE NEW MILLENNIUM ..................................................................................................................... 68  THE FINANCIAL CRISIS ...................................................................................................................... 70  THE FAR RIGHT FROM 1974 TO 2012 ................................................................................................. 74  INTRA-GOVERNMENTAL CRISES AND ANTI-RACIST MEASURES: RECENT DEVELOPMENTS 2012–2014 ................................................................................................ 76  

Parliamentary elections 2012 ....................................................................................................... 76  ‘Has Greece’s economy finally turned a corner?’ ....................................................................... 79  The anti-racist bill and the shut down of the Public Broadcasting Service ................................. 79  The murder of Pavlos Fyssas and the arrest of Michaloliakos .................................................... 80  

6   PEOPLE’S ASSOCIATION – GOLDEN DAWN ..................................................................... 82  IDEOLOGY ......................................................................................................................................... 83  

The third great ideology and the popular state ............................................................................ 83  A Golden Dawner ......................................................................................................................... 85  International aspirations .............................................................................................................. 87  Xenophobia and anti-immigration ............................................................................................... 87  

ORGANISATION ................................................................................................................................. 91  Structure ....................................................................................................................................... 91  Symbols and symbolism ................................................................................................................ 92  Solidarity programmes: Helping only Greeks .............................................................................. 95  

ELECTORAL SUPPORT ........................................................................................................................ 96  Younger support ........................................................................................................................... 98  

7   THE APPEAL OF THE EXTREME RIGHT ........................................................................... 99  HISTORY, NATIONALISM AND POLITICAL TRADITION ....................................................................... 99  XENOPHOBIA AND ANTI-IMMIGRATION: THE HESITANT POLICE RESPONSE .................................. 101  THE IDEOLOGY AND SYMBOLISM OF GOLDEN DAWN .................................................................... 102  THE FINANCIAL CRISIS AND THE BAILOUT ...................................................................................... 104  GOLDEN DAWN: A STEP FURTHER TO THE RIGHT? ......................................................................... 106  

Beyond the Greek borders: What can we learn from the case of Golden Dawn? ...................... 110  8   CONCLUSION ........................................................................................................................... 112  LITERATURE AND SOURCES ..................................................................................................... 114  APPENDIX ........................................................................................................................................ 125  

THE MANIFESTO OF GOLDEN DAWN ................................................................................................ 125  

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1 Introduction

This thesis looks at the rise of the extreme right-wing party People’s Association –

Golden Dawn (Greek: Λαϊκός Σύνδεσµος – Χρυσή Αυγή, XA1) in Greece. Towards

the end of the first decade of the 21st century, Europe was struck by a financial crisis.

In many countries the crisis led to social riots, instability and a sudden rise in mistrust

of government and leading politicians. Even if it is the cradle of democracy, modern-

day Greece has a long history of both authoritarian dictatorship and corruption. In the

years since the crisis struck there has been an increase in discrimination and street

violence, as well as a visibly larger support for parties at the far right of the political

spectrum. The increase in racially motivated violence in the wake of a financial crisis

can be seen in other European countries as well, such as Hungary today and Germany

in the early 20th century. Even so, few have yet to look at the direct link between

economic decline and the rise of extreme right-wing movements.2

Despite their more extreme neo-Nazi viewpoints, more people seem to think that XA

provides an alternative to the other political parties. Nevertheless, the party’s

involvement in criminal activities, violence and the murder of anti-fascist rapper and

activist Pavlos Fyssas has led the Greek government to consider banning the party.3

This led to a mass arrest of prominent Golden Dawn members, including the party

leader Nikolaos ‘Nikos’ Michaloliakos in October 2013.4 As of May 2014, the party is

still under investigation and Michaloliakos is still under arrest. Even so, XA has

received support from members of other neo-Nazi parties in Europe, including

1 I will be using Golden Dawn and the abbreviation XA interchangeably when referring to the

Greek party. 2 An exception is Alan de Bromhead, Barry Eichengreen & Kevin O’Rourke, ”Political Extremism

in the 1920s and 1930s: Do German Lessons Generalize?”, Journal of Economic History, vol. 73, nr. 2 (2012): 371-406.

3 See for instance Helena Smith, “Greece moves to ban far-right Golden Dawn party”, The Guardian, 18.09.2013

4 Helena Smith, “Golden Dawn leader Nikolaos Michaloliakos arrested”, The Guardian, 28.09.2013

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Svenskarnas parti in Sweden and Danskernes Parti in Denmark, as well as from the

leader of the British National Party, Nick Griffin.5 Despite allegations of violence and

criminal behaviour the party is surprisingly stable in the opinion polls, and in one of

the latest polls from the beginning of April 2014, the party had 9.9 per cent.6

Modern Greek history is built upon deep political cleavages, and the right side has

dominated Greek politics for most of the 20th century. The scope of my thesis

therefore stretches beyond just the time of Golden Dawn. The development in Greece

is not, I dare say, a unique phenomenon. Rather I argue that one can trace this and

similar events back in history. To understand recent developments I have therefore

gone as far back as to 1821, the year when modern Greece gained independence from

the Ottoman Empire. It is my belief that political culture combined with economic

downturn is the best explanation for the rise of the far right in Greece. In that way the

financial crisis may be seen solely as the precipitating cause for the recent political

developments in Greece. Even so, other possibly contributing factors, such as

increased European integration through membership in the EU, and also factors

directly related to Golden Dawn like ideology, rhetoric and the motivation of their

voters, will also be accounted for.

At the time of writing, the financial crisis has to some extent been declared over, with

the re-entrance of Greece on the international stock market in early April 2014.

However, the aftermath of the crisis is yet to be seen, and the effects are yet to be

analysed. The intention of this study is not to provide solutions, yet I hope it can

provide some insights and, at best, some explanations for the rise of support for the

extreme right in Greece.

5 See for instance Expo, ‘Svenska nynazister i protester med Gyllene gryning’, Expo, 04.02.2014;

Danskernes parti, ‘Danskernes Parti besøgte Gyldent Daggry’, 05.02.2014. 6 Opinion poll done by MRB for real.gr, 14.04.2014,

www.3comma14.gr/pi/view_survey.php?id=21469 [23.04.2014].

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Research question When I decided to write my thesis on the rise of Golden Dawn, I did so with the

presumption that the financial crisis was the main contributing factor to the party’s

increased support. My tentative research question was therefore the following:

What can explain the rise of the extreme right-wing party Golden Dawn in Greece?

Despite this, I knew that I had to take other factors into account before drawing such

an inference, and there was also a question of how big of a factor the financial crisis

actually was? To find an answer I would have to include other explanatory variables.

When looking into other factors beside the financial crisis that could explain the

increase in support of Golden Dawn the past years, I soon realised that the research

question was unfathomable. I would have to narrow it down, lest it become too big a

task for the limited time, and space, that I had been given. I therefore identified three

factors, or explanatory variables, to look into. As a result I ended up with the

following research question:

In light of the recent financial crisis, how do modern Greek history and political

tradition, party ideology, and European integration through membership in the

European Union affect the rise of the extreme right party Golden Dawn?

Though still unfathomable, it is now narrowed down to the three main factors that I

presume are most important, namely history and political traditions, party ideology,

and lastly, the effects of European integration through the European Union and

membership in the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU).

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Background

A short introduction to the history of Greece, 1821–2014

The modern history of Greece usually starts with the Greek War of Independence that

lasted from 1821 to 1829, including the recognition of Greece as an independent

nation in 1823. The period following the 1820s was highly unstable and also saw the

creation of a Greek identity that had been almost non-existent prior to the

independence. Nationalism grew strong and there was a wish to find a link between

ancient and modern Greece, emphasising the time of Alexander the Great.

After a period shifting between monarchy and republic, the Second Hellenic Republic

was proclaimed in 1924 as an attempt to restore stability. In the period that followed

Greece experienced a series of failed coups and small wars until, once again,

monarchy was restored as the Kingdom of Greece under George II in 1935. Less than

a year later, in August 1936, General Ioannis Metaxas staged a coup and declared

martial law. This was the start of a period of right-wing dictatorship that lasted until

Nazi-Germany’s invasion in 1941. Once more the nation was thrown into instability,

and the end of the Second World War was followed by a civil war between the

government and the communists of the Greek People’s Liberation Army (ELAS) that

lasted from 1947 to 1951.

The period after 1951 was characterised by American influence. The Western allies

were terrified of losing control over Greece because of her strategic position during

the Cold War and therefore helped prop up a weak state structure. This lasted until the

famous colonels’ coup of 1967. This was the start of a military dictatorship that lasted

until the Third Hellenic Republic was established in 1974.

After 1974, a two-party system dominated by the centre-right party New Democracy

(ND) and the social-democratic Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK) influenced

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Greek politics. After the fall of the colonels’ regime, the far right played a minor role

in Greek politics until the establishment of the populist party LAOS (Popular

Orthodox Rally) in 2000. LAOS represented a new generation within Greek politics

and was an alternative even further to the right for those who were not happy with the

majority rule of ND and PASOK. The period also saw the establishment of Golden

Dawn.

Golden Dawn and the situation in Greece today

Its current leader, Nikos Michaloliakos, founded Golden Dawn in 1980. Starting off as

a magazine, the party increased its involvement in politics from the beginning of the

1990s.7 In the elections of 2009 Golden Dawn obtained 0.29 per cent of the vote, i.e.,

less than 20,000 people voted for them. In the election in May 2012, however, they

had suddenly grown to 6.97 per cent, or 441,018 votes, a development that caused

some alarm in the media.8

Both Human Rights Watch (2012) and the Norwegian Refugee Council (2013) have

reported an increase in xenophobic or racially motivated violence in Greece.9 Along

the same lines, Alexandra Koronaiou and Alexandros Sakellariou refer to the ‘urban

myths’ about XA helping the general population with the difficulties they face in

everyday activities.10 Koronaiou and Sakellariou also refer to the establishment of a

Greek blood bank, as one of XA’s first initiatives after the election in 2012:

7 John S. Koliopoulos & Thanos M. Veremis, Modern Greece. A History since 1821, Malden, MA, Wiley-Blackwell, 2010.

8 Antonis A. Ellinas, ‘The Rise of Golden Dawn: The New Face of the Far Right in Greece’, in South European Society and Politics, vol. 18, no. 4 (2013); See also William Wheeler, ‘Europe´s New Fascists’, The New York Times, 17.11.2012; Rachel Donadio & Dimitris Bounias, ‘Hard Times Lift Greece’s Anti-Immigrant Fringe’, The New York Times, 12.04.2012; Associated Press, ‘Golden Dawn: leader of far-right party lashes out at Greece's “traitors”’, The Guardian, 06.05.2012.

9 See HRW, Hate on the streets: Xenophobic violence in Greece, Human Rights Watch, 2012; See also Flyktninghjelpen [Norwegian Refugee Council, Flyktningregnskapet. Alt om mennesker på flykt verden over, Flyktninghjelpen, 2013.

10 Alexandra Koronaiou & Alexandros Sakellariou, ‘Reflections on “Golden Dawn”, community organizing and nationalist solidarity: helping (only) Greeks’, in Community Development Journal, vol. 48, no. 2(2013).

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This took place at the end of June 2012, and the initiative was taken by the ‘Green (i.e.

ecological) Wing’ of the organization. The first announcement ends with the phrase: ‘Donate

blood – Save a Greek Soul’, while in another poster we read: ‘Blood bank and bank for

platelets, only for Greeks, who need our help’, with the phrase ‘only for Greeks’ being

underlined with the blue national colour.11

This illustrates how the XA define Greeks through blood and underlines their idea of

the importance of keeping the Greek blood pure. The blood bank can be seen as a

response to the massive inflow of immigrants the past decades, thereby creating a

feeling of ‘us’ vs. ‘them’, where providing health care and employment for ‘them’

(the immigrants) creates a problem for ‘us’ (the Greeks), or puts ‘us’ at the back of the

line.12 Playing on this, XA ‘[…] present themselves as the substitute for an inadequate

welfare state and the only political party that cares for the Greek people and its

communal needs’.13 Arguably, this is a clear parallel to the rise of NSDAP in

Germany between 1929 and 1933.

Unlike many other political parties in Greece, the Golden Dawn is at once both a

movement and a party, and I will therefore refer to it as both. Even so, to support

Golden Dawn is not the same as to vote for it. In that way, electoral results might give

an idea of the electoral basis of the party, but not of how many will actually take to the

streets in support of the movement. I therefore believe that it can at times be useful to

distinguish between the two. I will get back to this in Chapters 6 and 7.

Methodology My presumption is that the recent financial crisis is the main reason for the increase in

support for the right-wing extremists in Greece. Through a study of Greek history in

the 20th and 21st centuries I wish to answer why the extreme right have seen an

increase of support in the recent years of the financial crisis, and to see whether this is

11 ibid., 333. 12 For more on ‘us vs. them’ see Thomas Hylland Eriksen, Ethnicity and nationalism,

Anthropological Perspectives, London/New York: Pluto Press, 2010. 13 Koronaiou & Sakellariou 2013:334.

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a general tendency based on historical tradition or a new development. As a result, my

approach will be both descriptive and analytical, and I will have to rely heavily on

secondary sources.

A historian’s perspective

This thesis is written as a part of the history track of Peace and Conflict Studies at the

University of Oslo. History in the 21st century has for a long time been greatly

influenced by political science theories and also, though some may disagree, vice

versa. Not unlike how a political scientist may see how an event fits a selected theory,

the historian’s role is to see how specific events may differ from what is expected. In

my opinion, one can look at history in linear terms, as a long line that stretches from

the past to the present. The role of the historian is to highlight or explain the events

that differ from the expected linear ‘path’. Examples of such ‘irregularities’ are major

events or particular people of major importance that all in their own way have

participated to the creation of history, be it Alexander the Great, the French revolution

or the Second World War. This thesis can therefore to some extent be called cross-

disciplinary. Even so, though I am greatly inspired by political science theory, I am

first and foremost a historian. The same goes for this thesis.

In contrast to the idea that the great events and great men create history, some have

claimed that it is the historians themselves that create it. According to Martha Howell

and Walter Prevenier ‘… historians do not discover a past as much as they create it;

they choose the events and people they think constitute the past, and they decide what

about them is important to know’.14 In that way, one could say that history does not

exist until it is written. This leads to the question of the biasedness of the historian. A

historian should always strive to be objective in her interpretation, but like all other

researchers she may be influenced by the time of writing as well as by distance in time

and geography. In other words, one needs to understand both the time under study as

well as the time of the historian to understand how it may affect the interpretation, and

14 Martha Howell & Walter Prevenier, From Reliable Sources. An Introduction to Historical Methods, Ithaca/London:Cornell University Press, 2001:1.

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so a historian should always seek to describe history wie es eigentlich gewesen ist, or

as it really was.15

Research design

My research design will take the form of a typical single-case study. According to

John Gerring a ‘case study may be understood as the intensive study of a single case

where the purpose of that study is – at least in part – to shed light on a larger class of

cases (a population)’.16 I have chosen to do a single case study, focusing only on

Greece, as opposed to a comparative study involving one or several other countries.

This is first and foremost because I believe that the visibly increased support for an

extreme right party such as Golden Dawn, over a period of just a few years, is

interesting enough in itself to be worthy of a proper study, but also, arguably, because

in-depth knowledge of a single case can be better than fleeting knowledge of a

number of cases, since this can provide better grounds for generalisation at a later

stage.

My research question implies a causal relationship between both historical and more

recent developments in Greece and the rise of the extreme right. Describing and

identifying such a causal relationship requires a study of the processes behind it. Jack

Goldstone has emphasised the role of process tracing in explaining macro-historical

phenomena:

To identify the process, one must perform the difficult cognitive feat of figuring out which

aspects of the initial conditions observed, in conjunction with which simple principles of the

many that may be at work, would have combined to generate the observed sequence of

events.17

15 See Leopold von Ranke, ‘Preface: Histories of the Latin and Germanic Nations from 1494-

1514’, in Fritz Stern (ed.) The Varieties of History: From Voltaire to the Present, New York: Vintage Books, 1973:57.

16 John Gerring, Case Study Research. Principles and Practices, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007:20.

17 Alexander L. George & Andrew Bennett, Case studies and theory development in the social sciences, Cambridge/London: Mass/MIT, 2005.

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For the purpose of explaining my hypothesis, I will mainly make use of the method of

process tracing for my analysis. In that way it may be more of an analytical

explanation. This variety of process tracing ‘converts a historical narrative into an

analytical causal explanation couched in explicit theoretical forms’.18 A problem

regarding this type of process tracing is that the explanation may be deliberately

selective, and so only focus on aspects that are seen as particularly important. Process

tracing and historical explanation are closely related methods, and this is a typical

form of bias that may occur in historical explanation.

Bias in historical explanation

According to McCullagh, there are four common ways in which historical writing can

be biased.19 However, all of these may occur accidentally in historical explanation and

it should therefore not be called biased unless they occur because the historian wants

the outcome she has produced. First, a historian might sometimes misinterpret

evidence. Say you are writing about a significant event, claiming it occurred, when in

fact you are choosing to ignore all the evidence stating otherwise. Second, being

selective when choosing which sources or narratives to use may lead to an

unbalanced, or even unfair, interpretation of the past. Such a one-sided interpretation

may for instance highlight people’s virtues and ignore their vices. The third is when a

description of the past implies facts that are known to be false. McCullagh uses the

example of a Marxist that might describe a revolution as a class struggle, even though

there were no classes involved. The fourth is when one provides a causal explanation

of a historical event without mentioning all the important causes. The reader may then

get a misleading impression of the process that led to the event.

18 George & Bennett 2005:211, emphasis in original. 19 C. Behan McCullagh, “Bias in historical description, interpretation, and explanation”, in History

and Theory, vol. 39, no. 1(2000).

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Challenges regarding the use of secondary literature

Because of language barriers I will primarily make use of secondary sources, such as

previous historical works on modern Greece, newspaper articles and academic papers.

The phenomenon of right-wing extremism often comes in ‘waves’, and during and

after these ‘waves’ there is an increase in the number of published articles and

research projects. In other words, there are therefore periods with more information

than others. There are also examples of some parties or extreme right phenomena

having been studied more than others. One of the reasons for this is language. As

Müller-Rommel has noted:

Studying small parties obviously encounters some unique problems especially when it comes

to gathering information for a cross-national analysis. In most cases there are clearly language

problems. Although it is relatively easy to collect information on party programmes,

manifestos and party statutes, it is notably more difficult to read these brochures since (in

most cases) they have not been translated to English or another international language.20

Using secondary literature leads to questions of biasedness, since such literature has

been interpreted by someone else and is not presented in a neutral way, but rather

according to the wishes of the author. The best way of dealing with such bias is by

using several different interpretations; here this pertains to different authors, and also

different newspapers. The official website of the party is in Greek, I will therefore

make use of the official website of XA Ameriki, the local branch of Golden Dawn in

the United States, as well as the website known as the Golden Dawn International

Newsroom. Keeping in mind that these websites have been created for a more

international audience than the original, they still provide useful English translations

of official documents. The availability of this type of information is important for

analysing how XA define themselves to an external as well as an internal audience.

After all, it is not my intention to solely present the Greek view, but rather try to look

at recent developments in an outsider’s perspective. International newspaper articles

20 Ferdinand Müller-Rommel, ‘Small parties in comparative perspective: the state of the art’, in Ferdinand Müller-Rommel and Geoffrey Pridham (eds.), Small Parties in Western Europe. Comparative and National Perspectives, London: Sage, 1991:2.

11

are therefore essential in this regard. As for XA’s ideological positions, there are three

main documents that present the ideology of XA. The first is the official ideological

document Ιδεολογία (ideology), a pamphlet of about 16 pages that frequently quotes

Michaloliakos. The second is a political programme, πολιτικές θέσεις (political

positions). And the third is the Manifesto of Golden Dawn, also known as Ταυτότητα

(identity).21 All can be found on the official website of Golden Dawn as well as the

website of XA Ameriki and the International Newsroom, and the last can also be

found in the appendix. It should also be noted that only the second and the last are

available in English.

There are a number of both Greek and international authors who have written about

the history of modern Greece. For my own account of the years from 1821 to 2014 I

will mainly make use of the works of David S. Close, Richard Clogg and of John S.

Koliopulos and Thanos Veremis. These four authors are the most frequently cited

when it comes to accounts of Greek history in the designated period. From the late

2000s and up until today I will also make use of international newspaper articles as

well as academic papers. Whilst I am aware that the media is rarely unbiased, I still

believe that I have been able to analyse the available material as objectively as

possible. Throughout my thesis, I have explicitly expressed my concerns whenever I

have been in doubt of an interpretation.

21 The whole manifesto can be found in the appendix. The English translation has been proofread

by Nina Biering Alexidis, with the note mentioned in footnote 229.

12

The following chapters In the next chapter I will provide a thorough discussion of theories on the rise of the

extreme right, the purpose of which will be to create a theoretical framework for

further analysis of Golden Dawn. I will then move on to the main part of the thesis,

starting with Chapter 3, 1821–1949: Shaping Modern Greece. Here I will give a brief

overview of the history of Greece since independence in 1821, especially focusing on

political developments. Chapter 4 is a continuation of Chapter 3, now focusing on the

years between 1949 and 1990. The main focus is still political developments, but

particular attention will be given to foreign affairs, and especially European

integration after the end of the civil war. In Chapter 5, 1990–2014: The Financial

Crisis, I will look at more contemporary issues. I will here provide a thorough account

of the developments in Greece during the financial crisis, again focusing on politics,

but also on public response. Chapter 6, People’s Association – Golden Dawn, will

briefly look at the history of Golden Dawn from its establishment and up until today.

Specific attention will be paid to ideology, symbolism and organisation. Moving on to

the last chapter in the main part of this thesis, Chapter 7, The Appeal of the Extreme

Right, will sum up some of the arguments made in the previous chapters. I will also

discuss how my case fits the theoretical framework presented in Chapter 2. The thesis

ends with a conclusion in Chapter 8.

13

2 Theoretical framework: Extremism from the margins to the mainstream

Extreme right parties are commonly described as nationalist, populist, against the

ruling system or against specific parties, and often, but not always, fascist.22 For

something to be extreme, it needs to tip the scale as far away from the centre, and

from what is considered ‘moderate’, as possible.23 It can therefore be seen as an

anomaly. On the political scale one can slide and be extreme both to the left and to the

right, the only resemblance being the distance from the ‘safe’ centre. For a party to be

categorised as extreme right, it therefore needs to be as far to the right as possible.

Nothing can exceed the extreme.

The main theoretical framework is based on theories of the rise of the extreme right,

supported by relevant concepts like fascism, nationalism and populism. If one is to

fully understand a phenomenon, such a discussion may be useful for further

categorisation of the phenomenon under study, in this case the role of XA and how the

party fits the concepts that I have already mentioned. Categorisation helps isolate the

phenomenon and makes it easier to determine what approach to use for further

studies. The purpose of this chapter is therefore to create a framework for my later

analysis on the rise of right-wing extremism in Greece, and of Golden Dawn in

particular. It should be noted that opposed to the concepts of nationalism, populism

and fascism, there are no commonly accepted definitions of the extreme right.

Supporting concepts There is a vast amount of research done on the concepts of nationalism, fascism and

populism, and it is not my intention to review it all. Instead I wish to give a brief

22 Ian McLean & Alistair McMillan, Oxford Concise Dictionary of Politics, Oxford, Oxford

University Press, 2003:189. 23 Uwe Backes, ‘Meaning and Forms of Political Extremism in Past and Present’, in Central

European Political Studies Review, vol. IX, no. 4(2012).

14

overview of the concepts, narrowing them down to simple definitions applicable in

my theoretical framework. The concepts will be discussed in chronological order,

starting with the oldest concept, that of nationalism. I have chosen to do my

discussion in chronological order because I believe it highlights the importance if the

concepts, as well as the fact that they are products not only of the time in which they

originated, but also of each other. And so, as we will see, the concept of fascism is

greatly influenced by nationalism, just as the concept of populism is influenced by

both fascism and nationalism.

Nationalism

The concept of nationalism is relatively new, and the most common meanings were

developed during the 20th century. Nationalism may refer to feelings of patriotism in

the form of strong bonds towards the constitutions of one’s nation, including

language, culture, history, and shared ancestry (ethnicity), to mention some. This

definition is at once both subjective and objective. It is subjective in its reference to

feelings of belonging, and objective in reference to the concrete factors that one may

have in common, such as language, culture, and so on. In that way it is inspired by

Joseph Stalin, who said that

[a] nation is an historically constituted, stable community of people, formed on the basis of a

common language, territory, economic life, and psychological make-up manifested in a

common culture24

However, it is also inspired by Benedict Anderson, who in his book Imagined

Communities defined the nation as ‘an imagined political community – and imagined

as both inherently limited and sovereign.’25 But most of all, it is inspired by Anthony

D. Smith, who in his book Nationalism has tried to summarise all the previous usages

of the term nationalism in the following five main points:

24 Joseph Stalin [1973], quoted in Anthony D. Smith, Nationalism. Cambridge/Malden, MA: Polity

Press, 2001:11. 25 Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities. Reflections on the Origin and Spread of

Nationalism, London/New York: Verso, 2006[1983]:6.

15

1) a process of formation, or growth, of nations

2) a sentiment or consciousness of belonging to the nation

3) a language and symbolism of the nation

4) a social and political movement on behalf of the nation

5) a doctrine and/or ideology of the nation, both general and particular26

The first point highlights nationalism as a process and should be directly linked with

the term ‘nation’. According to Benedict Anderson the ‘nation’ is an imagined

political community. 27 It is imagined because those who define themselves as

members of a nation ‘will never know most of their fellow-members, meet them, or

even hear of them, yet in the minds of each lives the image of their communion.’28 In

other words there is an idea of a unity, something that they all have in common and

that holds them together within the borders of the same community. The borders

imply that the nation is limited, and beyond the boundaries of this imagined

community one can find other nations.

This leads us to Smith’s second point, for the nation is also imagined as a

‘community’, referring to deep-felt emotions of belonging. It is this imagined

horizontal comradeship that makes it possible for so many of its members to willingly

die for their nation. This process or growth of nations should not only be seen as a

product of history, but also as a product of modern developments. In short, Anderson

argues that these imagined communities are ideologically constructed through what he

calls ‘print capitalism’, referring to the development of the printing press which made

it possible to spread information to a much larger part of the population.

Smith remarks that is important to distinguish between the second point and the

following three. Though they can be closely related, a national sentiment or

26 Smith 2001:5–6. 27 Anderson 2006[1983]. 28 ibid., 6.

16

consciousness of belonging can exist without ideology, symbolism and a political

movement. The term nationalism should therefore be understood here as referring to

the last three points, and I will therefore consider them together.

Many have written about the importance of language and symbolism in creating

unity.29 In strong forms of nationalism, all of those who do not belong are considered

anomalous and may be shunned. In a nation it is usually in the interest of the ruling

party to have support from a more or less unified people. If there is no obvious

foundation for creating unity, this can be artificially created through the use of

symbols. Some have argued that politics cannot be purely instrumental, but must

involve symbols that have the power of creating loyalty and a feeling of belonging.30

The typical nation-state would therefore draw on similarities or known symbols, such

as the national flag, to create a form of unity. Previous studies have shown that

nationalism frequently draws on religion and myth when creating symbols. Bruce

Kapferer, for one, has done a study of violence and nationalism in Sri Lanka and

Australia.31 His study shows that in these two cases, nationalism functioned to instil

passions and profound emotions in those who followed it. This can also be seen in

modern Greece, where Golden Dawn has made use of the old Minoan symbol of the

Meandros as the party emblem. According to Eriksen, ‘[t]he use of presumedly [sic]

typical ethnic symbols in nationalism is intended to stimulate reflection on one’s own

cultural distinctiveness and thereby create a feeling of nationhood.’32 I will get back to

this in Chapter 3, as well as in Chapter 6 on Golden Dawn.

In Chapter 3, I write that Greece in the 19th century saw the need for the building of

both nation and nationality. Nation building was a common phenomenon throughout

the 19th century and though many found it difficult to define exactly what it was, the

idea behind it was simple: to create unity. In modern Greece, nationalism has been

29 Smith 2001; Eriksen 2010. 30 Eriksen 2010:121. 31 Referred to in Eriksen 2010:129. 32 ibid., 124.

17

used to build the nation-state, but it has also been used to emphasise the creation of a

national identity, i.e., a Greek nationality. However, the creation of such unity has also

led to an increase in xenophobia, or fear of the unknown, and a frequent report of

shunning of those who are not considered ‘Greek’. The question, then, is to whom

exactly does this unity apply? When it comes to language, symbols and even national

ideology, all three can be used to promote the ‘well-being’ of the nation. According to

Smith the goals to a nation’s well-being are national autonomy, national unity and

national identity.33 In the case of Greece, one could claim that neither of these existed

beyond the creation of the modern Greek state. As I will later come to argue, it was

therefore necessary to go back to the ‘roots’ of the Greek people, building a

connection between ancient Greece and the prospects of a new nation independent of

the Ottoman Empire. This understanding of nationalism is essential if one wishes to

understand the developments in Greece between 1821 and today.

Fascism

Defining fascism is difficult, since most fascist movements have elements that are

unique, or at least differ from other similar movements. Finding a definition that can

be considered omnibus, is therefore not without difficulties. Originally used as a word

of salutation by Benito Mussolini in the early 1920s, fascism has come to describe

authoritarian movements, and especially the Italian fascist movement of Mussolini

and the Nazism of Adolf Hitler. In the case of Golden Dawn, media have to a larger

extent come to use the term neo-Nazi in their description of the party, referring to

their strong nationalistic tendencies and, many would point out, similarities to the

German Nazism.34 This is despite the fact that Golden Dawn does not consider itself

to be a neo-Nazi party.

What, then, does fascism consist of? In Fascism: Comparison and Definition, Payne

offers a typological description of Fascism based on:

33 Smith 2001:9. 34 Associated Press, ‘Golden Dawn: leader of far-right party lashes out at Greece's “traitors”’, The

Guardian, 06.05.2012.

18

A. The Fascist Negations

B. Ideology and Goals

C. Style and Organisation.35

This description is helpful when distinguishing between the ‘old’ and ‘new’ fascism.

In the introduction to The Extreme Right, Aurel Braun indicates that though fascism

traditionally was seen as the most serious threat to democracy, the radical rightist

parties are the ones that mostly hold this threat today. Thereby he creates a distinction

between fascism and radical right parties, claiming that the latter only share a

superficial resemblance to the old fascist regimes.36 Some have claimed that there has

been a move away from defining generic fascism as a style or organisational structure,

and towards a larger focus on the ideological core of fascism.37 This suggests that

fascism could be divided between an old and a new version. The question, then, is

when did the concept of fascism change? A useful division is done between ‘old’

inter-war fascism and the ‘new’ post-war fascism, with the Second World War as the

peak of the ‘old’ fascism.

The nature of fascism

Payne should be complemented with Roger Griffin. In his work, The Nature of

Fascism, Griffin seeks to create a general definition of fascism that may fit and

include all elements of fascist movements throughout the 20th century. 38 The premises

for Griffin’s discussion were that fascism could not be given an absolute definition

35 Stanley G. Payne, Fascism: Comparison and Definition, Madison: The University of Wisconsin

Press, 1980:7; See also Stanley Payne, ‘The Concept of Fascism’, in Stein Uglevik Larsen, Bernt Hagtvet & Jan Petter Myklebust (eds.). Who were the Fascists. Social Roots of Europea Fascism. Bergen: Universitetsforlaget, 1980.

36 Aurel Braun, ‘Introduction’, Aurel Braun & Stephen Scheinberg (eds.) The Extreme Right. Freedom and Security at Risk, Oxford/Colorado: Westview Press, 1997:2.

37 Roger Griffin, ‘Fascism’s new faces (and new facelessness) in the “post-fascist” epoch’, in Roger Griffin, Werner Loh and Andreas Umland (eds.), Fascism Past and Present, West and East, Stuttgart: ibidem Verlag, 2006.

38 Roger Griffin, The Nature of Fascism, London: Routledge, 1994[1991]:44; Stanley G. Payne, A History of Fascism 1914-45, Oxon: Routledge, 2005[1995]:5.

19

because it was an ideal type. Griffin therefore wished to ‘identify a common core of

fascist phenomena which can be treated as its definitional minimum’, to ‘clarify how

fascism relates to a number of other social scientific terms’, to ‘complement […] what

has been established by existing historical scholarship about the dynamics of

particular movements and regimes which it identifies as members of the family of

generic fascisms’, and lastly to ‘represent an advance on existing ideal types in terms

of succinctness and manageability’, all for the purpose of establishing a generic

definition of fascism.39 There are ten a priori features of fascism as a political

ideology that could be used as a starting point for further research. Somewhat

simplified, these ten features will be summed up below.

Fascism is driven by an ideology that is all-consuming and visible not only in their

politics, but also in their speeches, songs, symbols and writings (i). It is an

omnipresent worldview, often with a utopian revolutionary aspect (ii), even though

only a fantasy, or a ‘travesty’, as Griffin puts it, of this utopia will ever be realised

(iii). Outsiders will interpret the fascist thought as propaganda, but supporters will see

it as an outlet for idealism and self-sacrifice (iv). The fascists will try to rationalise

their worldview by appealing to historical, religious or scientific ‘facts’, though in

truth it will mainly be driven by irrationality and mythical assumptions (v).

Commitment may be displayed on varying levels of both emotional intensity and

active support, and so too the motivation for joining (vi, viii). The fascist ideas may be

expressed both in a sophisticated and a simpler manner, and many of its supporters

may have individual interpretations of the goals of the movement (vii). It is not

possible to reduce the fascist ideology and movement to the ideology of a single

individual ideologue or a leader; rather it is a response to historical as well as

contemporary surroundings (ix). Lastly, generic fascism is ‘definable ideal-typically

in terms of a cluster of values and goals common to all its various permutations, in

39 Griffin 1994[1991]:12-13.

20

other words its ideological core’ (x).40 Taking this into account, Griffin ended up with

the following definition:

Fascism is a genus of political ideology whose mythic core in its various permutations is a

palingenetic form of populist ultra-nationalism.41

The mythic core of fascism as political ideology is essential. ‘Mythic’ here refer to

‘the inspirational, revolutionary power which an ideology can exert whatever its

apparent rationality or practicality.’42 In other words, the mythic core is the basis of

the ideology as such, and may also be one of the main gathering forces of the

movement. The revolutionary power should be seen together with what Griffin

characterises as ‘palingenetic’. Palingenetic is most often translated as ‘rebirth’, but

should not necessarily be interpreted as ‘backwards-looking’, i.e., as the rebirth of

something old. Rather, it should simply be seen as something new, after a period of

decadence. This could be a new order, a new society, or even the birth of ‘a new man’.

In other words, palingenetic may refer to the emphasis on the rebirth of the national

spirit, culture and society, and it should therefore be linked with nationalism, as will

be discussed below. It is worth noting that The Manifesto of Golden Dawn frequently

speaks of the creation of a new world order and specifically of the birth of a new type

of man (see Chapter 6).

As for populist ultra-nationalism, Griffin divides the concept into two. By defining

each part separately he emphasises that ‘populist’ should be understood as ‘a generic

term for political forces which, even if led by small elite cadres or self-appointed

“vanguards”, in practice or in principle […] depend on “people power” as the basis of

their legitimacy.’ 43 ‘Ultra-nationalism’, on the other hand, refers to ‘forms of

nationalism which “go beyond”, and hence reject, anything compatible with liberal

40 ibid. 41 ibid., 26, my emphases. 42 ibid., 28. 43 ibid., 36-37.

21

institutions or with the tradition of Enlightenment humanism which underpins them.’44

It is only combined that the two can be used as a fascist minimum in a generic

definition.

A. The fascist negations

Going back to Payne, his first point could also be referred to as ‘what fascism is not’.

The negations that are listed by Payne are anti-liberalism, anti-communism and anti-

conservatism, but the list could easily have been expanded to include other negations.

Many scholars have focused on fascism as an anti-phenomenon, referring to what it

opposes rather than what it consists of. Payne, as we have seen, is no exception.

Griffin, on the other hand, disagrees with this. Fascism should not only be

characterised through its ‘anti-’ dimension, but rather one needed to identify an

ideological core applicable to a generic definition, as stated above.

B. Ideology and goals

Payne’s second point is a bit more complex than the first. Fascist movements seek the

creation of a new nationalist authoritarian state. They seek the organisation of a new

kind of ‘regulated, multiclass, integrated national economic structure, whether called

national corporatist, national socialist, or national syndicalist’. 45 They are

revolutionary, meaning that they seek a radical change in the nation’s relationship

with other powers. However, they also seek to realise ‘a new form of modern, self-

determined, secular culture.’46 Griffin too seems to emphasise revolution in particular

as one of the primary objectives of a fascist regime. As an example, Griffin, in a short

analysis, called the regime of Metaxas (1936–41) ‘fascism from above’, referring to

how Metaxas embarked on a campaign to persuade the Greeks that they formed a

‘blood community’.47 As other nationalist movements in Greece, he spoke of the

connection between ancient and modern Greece, and wished to create the Third

44 ibid, 37. 45 Payne 1980:7. 46 ibid. 47 Griffin 1994[1991]:122.

22

Hellenic Civilisation. However, since the revolutionary ideas and ideals of Metaxas

were never put into reality through any sort of social revolution Griffin characterises

the regime solely as a para-fascist dictatorship.48 Even so, it should be mentioned that

Griffin solely speaks of the regime. Whether or not the movement and ideology of

Metaxas could also be categorised as ‘para-fascist’, is not for this thesis to analyse,

but the distinction should be remembered during my later account of XA as a

movement (Chapters 6 and 7).

C. Style and organisation

As for the third point, fascism emphasises the use of aesthetic structure, symbols,

political choreography, and they also stress romantic and mystical aspects. They

attempt mass-mobilisation and emphasise a militant political leadership, with the goal

of a mass party militia. The masculine principle and male dominance is of the utmost

importance; so is the exaltation of youth. Lastly, the style and organisation is

authoritarian and charismatic, with a personal style of command. The ‘mystical

aspects’ can be compared with the ‘mythical core’ that governs ideology in Griffin’s

definition.

Payne’s typological description is created for the purpose of separating fascist

movements from other revolutionary or nationalist movements. Though such a

tripartite division may be useful, it is meant merely as an analytical tool, and it can

here mostly be related to the ‘old’ inter-war fascism, referred to above. Even so, as we

will see in Chapter 6, elements of both A, B and C can still be found in more modern

movements with visibly fascist inspirations, such as Golden Dawn.

Fascism and Nazism

The term fascism still holds strong connotations to the fascist regimes of Mussolini

and Hitler, and similar authoritarian nationalist movements today are mostly

categorised as belonging to ‘the radical right’. The most profound difference between

48 ibid.

23

the old fascists and the new radical right is the willingness of the latter to be

categorised at the right end of the political spectrum. As Payne has noted in a later

work, the number of neo-fascist and right radical or authoritarian groups has increased

over the last decades, and there are several different kinds of neo-fascists that can be

identified.49 It is common that such neo-fascists present themselves as ‘national

revolutionaries’, and there are some who advocate more extreme forms of National

Socialism, including a tendency toward ‘social racism’ (in the case of Nazism); as I

will argue later, this is also a prominent feature in the ideology of Golden Dawn.

Both ‘fascism’ and ‘Nazism’ has been used to describe extreme right movements – so

too in the case of Golden Dawn. In the words of Eugen Weber the main difference

between the two can be found in that whilst ‘Fascism is pragmatically activist,

National Socialism is theoretically motivated or, at least, expressed.’50 By this he

refers to the two ideologies’ use of power through parties. Whereas the fascist party

will use the power pragmatically and piecemeal, simply for its own sake, the national

socialist party would use the power to realise an anterior plan inspired by the original

doctrine. Once in power, the fascist party will gradually disintegrate, but the national

socialist party may increase its influential position in society and become similar to a

‘church’.51 It is tempting, then, to compare it with generic fascism and say that

National Socialism may in fact be the mythical core of fascism. Though both terms

may be used separately, it has been common to define National Socialism (or Nazism)

as a sub-category of fascism. In that way National Socialism can be seen as a part of

fascism, but the opposite is more difficult to defend.

49 Payne 2005[1995]:498. 50 Eugene Weber, ‘Extract from Varieties of Fascism’, Roger Griffin and Matthew Feldman (eds.)

Fascism. Critical concepts in political science, volume I: The Nature of Fascism, London/New York: Routledge, 2004:80.

51 ibid.

24

Populism

There are two main reasons why the concept of populism is relevant in this thesis.

First of all, I believe that XA’s effective use of populism might have been a

contributing factor to the party’s sudden rise in popularity. Second, as we will see,

understanding the concept of populism is essential for understanding the concept of

the extreme right.

There are two commonly accepted interpretations of the concept of populism. The

first is when politics is used to stir people’s emotions by offering simplistic solutions.

The second is when it is used to ‘describe opportunistic policies with the aim of

(quickly) pleasing the people/voters – and so “buying” their support – rather than

looking (rationally) for the “best option”.’52 Populism can be found on both ends of

the political spectrum, though it is most often associated with the (radical) right. The

concept and phenomenon of populism have often been ‘blamed’ for the success of

more radical right parties. And it can also be seen in connection with the role of the

media.53 Cas Mudde has defined populism as:

[…] an ideology that considers society to be ultimately separated into two homogenous and

antagonistic groups, ‘the pure people’ versus ‘the corrupt elite’, and which argues that politics

should be an expression of the volonté general (general will) of the people.54

This definition emphasises a cleavage in society between ‘the elite’ and ‘the people’.

Though many have written and agree about this cleavage, the question of what

populism is still remains to be answered. Is it ‘…an ideology, a syndrome, a political

movement or a political style?’55 The definition by Mudde above states that it is an

ideology, but other definitions have chosen to emphasise the rhetorical function of

populism, making it more a political style than an ideology. Margaret Canovan, for

52 Cas Mudde, ‘The Populist Zeitgeist’, Government and Opposition, vol. 39, no. 4(2004):542. 53 Mudde 2004. 54 ibid., 543. 55 ibid.

25

one, has written that populism can be understood as ‘an appeal to “the people” against

both the established structure of power and the dominant ideas and values…’56 In

other words, populism is closely related to the demos in democracy. This is also in

line with Anthony Painter’s definition of populism as a democratic argument:

It is ‘democratic’ in the sense that it appeals to common conceptions that the rule of the

people is a good thing, and it is an ‘argument’ rather than a particular ideology or set of

policies.57

The people can here be defined in many ways, for it is not my impression that many

parties that make use of populist rhetoric agree with the majority on who the people

consist of. The past years have seen an increase in what has been termed ‘xenophobic

populism’, in which the wish to end immigration has been used in populist rhetoric to

gain larger support, especially in times of economic crisis.58

One of the reasons why it may be difficult to distinguish between National Socialist,

fascist and populist movements is because all three share similar elements. Put another

way, populism may be used as a political style for fascist movements, and many

consider fascism as an umbrella definition for both National Socialist and, I dare say,

populist movements. For instance, many theorists have seen populist ultra-nationalism

as an important part of the fascist ideology.59 Distinguishing between the concepts is

therefore not the same as isolating them entirely.

56 Margaret Canovan, ‘Trust the People! Populism and the Two Faces of Democracy’, in Political

Studies, XLVII(1999):2; See also Margaret Canovan, ‘Populism for Political Theorists?’, in Journal of Political Ideologies, vol. 9, no.3(2004).

57 William Brett, ‘What’s an Elite to Do? The Threat of Populism from Left, Right and Centre’, in The Political Quarterly, vol. 84, no. 3(2013):410.

58 See Aristos Doxiadis & Manos Matsaganis, National populism and xenophobia in Greece, Counterpoint, 2012; Brett 2013.

59 See Griffin 1994[1991]; Kevin Passmore, Fascism: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002.

26

The extreme right family:

The populist radical right vs. the extreme right

Klaus von Beyme and the ‘familles spirituelles’

How does one define the members of a party family? Klaus von Beyme speaks of

‘familles spirituelles’ that can be found at the ideological level of the parties. Von

Beyme has distinguished nine such ‘spiritual families’:

(i) Liberal and radical parties

(ii) Conservative parties

(iii) Socialist and social democratic parties

(iv) Christian democratic parties

(v) Communist parties

(vi) Agrarian parties

(vii) Regional and ethnic parties

(viii) Right-wing extremist parties

(ix) The ecology movement60

This division is done on the basis of two ideological criteria, namely the name of the

party and the voters’ perception of the party’s ideological position as well as the party

programmes. This creates a guideline for distinguishing between the party families,

but not of the individual parties that constitute these families. Furthermore, in the case

of right-wing extremist parties, actually placing these parties within the eighth family

mentioned above, leads to some problems that need to be addressed. First of all, most

right-wing extremist parties deny being extreme, and some even object to being called

right-wing. Defining a party’s belonging in the party family on the basis of party name

and voters’ perception is therefore close to impossible. Who, then, should be allowed

to define and classify? An obvious suggestion is the researchers, but even they seem

60 See Cas Mudde. The ideology of the extreme right. Manchester/New York: Manchester

University Press, 2000:2; Klaus von Beyme, Political Parties in Western Democracies. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1985:3.

27

to have some trouble agreeing on a name for the party family, referring to it as ‘the

radical populist right’, ‘the extreme right’ or just ‘the far right’, to mention some.61

Based on the framework of Klaus von Beyme, Anders Widfeldt divides the most

common labels of extreme right parties into three groups:62

Group 1: ‘neo-fascist’

Group 2: ‘extreme right’ (and ‘right-wing extremist’), ‘far right’, ‘radical right’

Group 3: ‘populist right’, ‘right-wing populist’

Widfeldt also speaks of labels that overlap group 2 and 3. I have chosen to call this

group 4:

Group 4 (2+3): ‘populist radical right’, ‘radical right-wing populist’

Again we see the reference to the concepts mentioned above, with a higher frequency

of the label ‘populist’ and more of an ideological relation to ‘fascism’. To label a

party as ‘extreme’ has two primary meanings: Either it means that the party is extreme

relative to other parties or that it is extreme relative to the existing political system.

The last meaning has a revolutionary aspect to it that is not as common today as it was

during the time of the French Revolution, but even so I believe that opposing the

existing system is a common feature in modern Greek history even to this day.

‘Radicalism’, ‘extremism’ and ‘populism’

Cas Mudde divides the radical right party family into two, distinguishing between

populist radical right and extreme right-wing parties. In The ideology of the extreme

right, Mudde distinguishes between ‘radicalism’ and ‘extremism’ by saying that

whereas the former is verfassungswidrig, meaning that it is opposed to the

61 This discussion draws on Mudde 2000; See also Anders Widfeldt, ‘A fourth phase of the

extreme right? Nordic immigration-critical parties in a comparative context’ in NORDEUROPAforum, ½(2010).

62 Widfeldt 2010.

28

constitution, the latter is verfassungsfeindlich, or hostile to the constitution.63 This

difference is of the utmost practical importance for the involved political parties since

extremist parties are usually extensively watched and can even be banned, whereas

radical parties are usually left alone to a greater extent.64

Mudde has also noted the more frequent use of the term populism in relation to the

extreme right, with variants such as ‘right-wing populism’, ‘radical right-wing

populism’, ‘national populism’, ‘new populism’, ‘neo-populism’ and so on.65 Some of

these are already mentioned in the Widfeldt-inspired group 4 above, and the rest could

easily be added. According to Mudde, there is not a significant difference between the

term populism and the term extreme right. For instance, he has identified two different

uses of the term populism in relationship with the term extremism in the literature. In

the first it is used to describe the more moderate parties of the extreme right. In the

second it is used ‘exclusively to describe a certain political style used by right-wing

extremist parties.’ 66 The various terms are often used synonymously, and not

necessarily with any clear intention. In fact, Mudde himself chooses to use the term

‘populist radical right’ in a later work.67

In an attempt to clarify these concepts, Anders Jupskås has contributed to the

literature with a similar division of the far right.68 He distinguishes between the

‘extreme’, ‘radical’ and ‘populist’ right. Common features among the classes of

extreme right include anti-democracy, ethnic nationalism, authoritarianism, racism,

xenophobia, and what Jupskås has called ‘conspiracy theorists’.69 It is interesting to

note that according to Jupskås, the extreme right does not need to fulfil all of the

63 Mudde 2000:12. 64 ibid. 65 ibid., 13. 66 ibid. 67 See Cas Mudde, Populist Radical Right Parties in Europe, Cambridge: Cambridge University

Press, 2007. 68 Anders Ravik Jupskås, Ekstreme Europa. Ideologi, årsaker og konsekvenser, Oslo: Cappelen

Damm, 2012. 69 ibid., 47; ‘Konspirasjonsteoretikere’ in Norwegian.

29

above-mentioned features, but they should all be seen in connection with anti-

democracy, the most prominent one. In short, the largest difference between the

extreme right and the radical right is that the latter is not considered anti-democratic.

Neither is it characterised by biological racism.70 The populist right is similar to the

radical right, but the ‘populist’ part, i.e., the appeal to the will or wishes of the people

is one of its more dominant features. This division should still only be seen as a

guideline for a definition, as each and every movement may differ according to its

historical and cultural context.

Defining the extreme right How do extremists go from the margins to the mainstream? The extreme right can be

seen as a phenomenon that comes in ‘waves’, meaning that there are periods when the

extreme right parties enjoy a larger degree of support than others. A lot of research

has therefore been done trying to establish why such parties often see an intermittent

increase in their support. Previous studies have shown that there is a link between

economic decline and extremism, but that economic decline cannot be the only

factor.71 De Bromhead et al. have tried to generalise the growth of political extremism

in Germany in the 1920s and 1930s. According to them, ‘[e]xplanations for political

extremism in this period fall into five broad categories: economic factors, social

cleavages, external influences, electoral systems, and institutional/cultural

inheritances’.72 If they have succeeded in generalising the case of Germany beyond

the designated time period it should be possible to find elements of all five categories

in what is happening in present-day Greece as well (See Chapter 7).

Michi Ebata defines the extreme right by looking at some of its core features. These

features include a fundamental expression of hatred or prejudice that is rooted in an

70 ibid., 49. 71 De Bromhead et al. 2012. 72 ibid., 2.

30

‘ideology of inequality’. 73 This view is especially manifested in forms of xenophobia,

racism, homophobia, misogyny and religious intolerance. The hatred may also be

directed towards the state. As the author notes:

[…] hatred is far more than just an expressed sentiment; it is a source of action dedicated to

expelling the offending outsider from society in order to remake society into its ‘purer

historical’ form.74

Piero Ignazi gives a simpler definition. He has classified the whole family of extreme

right parties according to the following three criteria:

1) Placement at the far right of the national political spectrum

2) Fascist features in the party ideology

3) Negative attitude toward the political system75

He then goes on to use these criteria to distinguish between the ‘old’ and the ‘new’

extreme right, claiming that whereas the new extreme right is usually selected on the

basis of the first and third criteria, the old combine all three. Again we are reminded

of Aurel Braun’s above claim that the new radical right only shares a superficial

resemblance to the old fascist regimes, and that fascism as it was has ceased to be a

serious threat in the Western World.76 A lot seems to have changed in the nearly two

decades that have passed since Braun made his arguments. Today, one does not have

to look far to find radical right parties with clear fascist inspirations if not also

aspirations.77

73 Michi Ebata, ‘Right –Wing Extremism: In Search of a Definition’, in Aurel Braun & Stephen

Scheinberg (eds.) The Extreme Right. Freedom and Security at Risk, Oxford/Colorado: Westview Press, 1997.

74 Ebata 1997:14. 75 Piero Ignazi, ‘The silent counter-revolution. Hypotheses on the emergence of extreme right-

wing parties in Europe’, in European Journal of Political Research, vol. 22, no. 1–2(1992). 76 Braun 1997; Payne 1980. 77 Payne 2005[1995].

31

Defining the extreme may be easy, but distinguishing between the extremities may be

more difficult. One of the most common ways of defining the extreme right is through

its features. The study of right-wing extremism has differed over the years, and one

often hears talk of ‘waves’ of right-wing extremism, as mentioned above. During and

right after these ‘waves’ there is an increase in the publications on such issues and

parties. In The ideology of the extreme right, Cas Mudde has tried to give an overview

of previous definitions of the extreme right.78 Some of these definitions are based on

only one single feature, thereby obscuring other important features of their ideology.79

Others say that right-wing extremism can be defined by a combination of features that

constitutes a political ideology. 80 All in all, Mudde found twenty-six different

definitions in the literature that includes a total of fifty-eight different features of the

extreme right. Only five of these features are mentioned by at least half of the authors,

namely: nationalism, xenophobia, racism, anti-democracy and the strong state.81 In

other words, one cannot define the extreme right without taking into account what

they reject, such as democracy, human rights or capitalism, to mention a few. I have

chosen to call these the negations, inspired by the fascist negations mentioned above.

Terms such as ‘right-wing’, ‘right-wing extremist’ and ‘far right’ have all been used

to describe Golden Dawn, and at times it seems that neither researchers nor journalists

agree on what exactly, if anything at all, distinguishes these concepts from each other.

However, inspired by the known right–left line of politics I choose to place the

concepts on the political spectrum in the following way:

Extremists ß Far Left ß Left ß CENTRE à Right à Far Right à Extremists

78 Mudde 2000:10. 79 ibid.; See also Cas Mudde, ‘The single‐issue party thesis: Extreme right parties and the

immigration issue’, in West European Politics, vol. 22, no. 3(1999). 80 Mudde 2000:10. 81 Mudde 2000; Cas Mudde, ‘Right-wing extremism analyzed. A comparative analysis of the

ideologies of three alleged right-wing extremist parties (NPD, NDP, CP’86)’, in European Journal of Political Research, vol. 27, no. 2(1995).

32

There are three things that should be noted about this division. First of all, the terms

‘right-wing’/’left wing’ are not left out, but stand instead as subcategories of the ‘Far

Left’ and ‘Far Right’. I do not by this suggest that there is not some nuance to the

concepts at either of the far ends of the spectrum, in fact it would be possible to create

a spectrum within the concepts of the ‘far right’ and the ‘far left’, thereby

distinguishing between the ‘least extreme’ and the ‘most extreme’. When I have

chosen not to do so, it is solely for the following simple reason: I do not think that it is

fruitful to distinguish between extremities, since they have all already gone beyond

what is considered ‘normal’. When I refer to something as ‘far right’, I do so with the

notion of the ‘far right’ being an ‘umbrella definition’.

Second, ‘right’ here does not refer to the traditional ‘right’, but rather to a more

populist and radical direction in politics. A more specified version of the spectrum

should therefore look more like this, now only concentrating on the right side:

CENTRE à Populist right à Radical right-wing populists à Extreme right

To distinguish between these categories, it might be useful to use other known far

right parties. For instance, I would place the Norwegian Progress Party (FrP) under

the category populist right. FrP is populist in the sense that it frequently uses people’s

opinions to create policies that they know will please the majority of their voters. It

shares some of the fascist negations, already mentioned, in particular anti-

immigration, but it is not anti-system or revolutionary per se. Instead FrP wish to

change the system through legitimate means, i.e., by winning the majority vote during

elections. It should be noted that though I have chosen to categorise FrP as populist,

Piero Ignazi have claimed that FrP belong to the extreme right, arguing that they fit

point 1 and 3 in his three-point definition mentioned above.82 Moving on to the next

category, I would place the French Front National within the category of radical right-

wing populists, slightly more extreme than FrP. Lastly, compared to the other two and

82 See Piero Ignazi, Extreme Right Parties in Western Europe, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003.

33

in line with previous definitions, including the three-point-definition by Piero Ignazi,

Golden Dawn should be placed within the category of the extreme right.

Third, in the introduction I followed Uwe Backes when I said that nothing could

exceed the extreme.83 In this categorisation of right–left politics I have chosen to

make one exception, or rather, two, in that I’ve placed extremists at both ends of the

spectrum. It is one thing to be extreme; it is another to be an extremist. And so, both

radical and extremist parties may be extreme in politics measured by their opinions

and their opposition to the ‘centre’. However, the most important difference between

the populist right, the radical right-wing populists and the extreme right is that where

the former two would rather prefer to change the existing system through the system

itself – in other words by taking part in the democracy and gain power through

(legitimate) elections – only the latter would be willing to take lives, if necessary, to

accomplish their goals.84

Far right parties should not only be categorised by their policies and goals, but rather

by the measures they are willing to take to achieve them. However, the extremists

may also be known for what they are against, similar to Payne’s definition of fascism.

As the fascist movements could be defined by the fascist negations, so too could the

extremists. And so both fascists and extremists are known to be against the political

system; they explicitly criticise democracy and oppose human rights. In that way

Golden Dawn should clearly be classified as fascist however, it is also extreme in the

sense that they oppose the existing system and are willing to take extreme measures to

accomplish their goals. For my approach, I have chosen to focus on the features of

nationalism, fascism and populism, as defined above. In my later analysis of the

ideology of Golden Dawn (Chapters 6 and 7), those are the features that will guide my

discussion.

83 Backes 2012. 84 Jupskås 2012.

34

3 1821–1949: Shaping Modern Greece

1821–1923: The building of nation and nationality

From independence to the First World War

The independent state of Greece was established in 1821, with the first constitution

proclaimed in 1822. In the period following independence, Greece experienced a

series of tumults, often related to the western powers. In 1827 Ioannis Kapodistrias

became the first president, but when he was assassinated in 1831, the Convention of

London decided to turn Greece into a monarchy and offered the ‘hereditary

sovereignty’ of Greece to Otto, the second son of Ludwig I of Bavaria. The new state

was built according to western European ideals, and in many ways it was the western

powers that ascended the throne when King Otto arrived in his new kingdom in 1833,

aged only 17. Britain, Russia and France guaranteed the protection of this new

monarchical state.

Close to thirty years later, in 1862, King Otto was forced from his throne, after a

revolt supported by the army. King George I, a Danish prince, replaced him a year

later. Also at the age of 17, he ascended the throne as King of the Hellenes, and would

become the longest-reigning king in the history of the modern Greek state. King

George was assassinated by a madman in 1913, and was then replaced by his eldest

son, Konstantinos I.

In the early 1900s it became increasingly clear that it was the prime minister that

would become the most important political player and not the king – nor later the

elected presidents. Even so, the cleavage between the royalists and the republicans

would continue to dominate politics for years to come. In 1910, the Cretan Eleftherios

35

Venizelos, founder of the Liberal Party, became prime minister.85 The decade that

followed would be termed the ‘Venizelist decade’. Venizelos was quickly to be

known as a reformist, and during his first few months in office he implemented many

minor constitutional changes. Venizelos resigned in 1915, following a disagreement

with King Konstantinos I. The king favoured Germany and wished for Greek

neutrality in the First World War. Venizelos, on the other hand, feared the loss of the

Aegean Islands to the Ottoman Empire. He therefore argued for entering the war on

the side of the Triple Entente.86

Greek politics was highly unstable at the start of the First World War. Venizelos won

the election in June, just a few months after his forced resignation, and returned to

power in August, only to be forced to resign again in October. In the year that

followed Greece was divided into two. Venizelos travelled to Thessaloniki and

established a provisional government of ‘New’ Greece. Meanwhile the royalist

government in Athens held the ‘Old’ Greece, and successfully managed to defend the

port of Piraeus from an Anglo-French invasion, the result of which ended in a British

and French blockade of the ‘Old’ Greece.

From the Treaty of Sèvres to the Greek-Turkish War

The early 20th century witnessed the downfall of the Ottoman Empire. It also saw the

end of Greece’s territorial expansion. The end of the First World War was marked

with the Conference of Paris in 1919, the result of which was the Treaty of Sèvres in

1920. The treaty recognised Greece’s annexation of Thrace and the Aegean Islands,

with the exception of the Dodecanese Islands that were under Italian occupation until

1947. The Treaty of San Remo, also from 1920, allowed Greece to exercise sovereign

rights over Smyrna (Izmir) for a transition period of five years.87

85 It is interesting to note that even though Venizelos as a Cretan became prime minister in 1910,

Crete was not officially recognised as a part of Greece until 1913. 86 Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:75. 87 ibid., 76; Richard Clogg. A Concise History of Greece. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,

2013:93.

36

Venizelos had participated at the Conference of Paris in 1919, and there he had

spoken for the protection for the Greek populations living in Anatolia. The Treaty of

Sèvres, however, was mainly concerned with the protection of the ethnic groups of the

Ottoman Empire, although Armenia saw its independence, Kurdistan gained

autonomy and even Greece saw significant changes to its territory.88

The settlement after the First World War and the Treaty of Sèvres was the closest

Modern Greece had ever been to fulfilling the Megali Idea. This great idea was an

irredentist project, seeking to unite all areas of Greek settlement into a single state

whose capital would be Constantinople. There were two opposing causes, that of the

heterochthons, the Greeks outside of the newly independent kingdom, and the

autochthons, the ‘natives’ that resided within the kingdom. According to Ioannis

Kolettis, who first voiced the Megali Idea, all who resided within the areas associated

with Greek history or the Greek race were Greeks.89 During the war the Great Idea

created a cleavage in society that would be known as the National Schism, or Ethnikos

Dikhasmos.90 This cleavage would come to play a large part in Greek politics in the

years that followed.

The military’s gradually increased involvement in politics can be seen in the election

of 7th of November 1920. Prior to the election, Venizelos wished to expand the

electorate to include the Greek populations in the newly controlled areas of Smyrna

and Thrace. He also, for the first time, introduced the military vote. In 1919 the

Military League had been organised by a group of officers with the purpose of

intimidating any opposition against Venizelos, and plans were even made for a

military government in the case of a royal victory.91 King Alexander took over when

his father went into exile in 1917, but his death in 1920, following blood poisoning

88 Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:76. 89 Clogg 2013:47. 90 ibid., 83. 91 Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:87.

37

caused by a bite from a pet monkey, would once again raise the question of

constitutional reform. Venizelos had hoped to win the population over by his

achievements in the Treaty of Sèvres, and many, including Venizelos himself, have

blamed war weariness for a result that came as a surprise for observers.92 The election

turned into a fight between Venizelos and the royalists, in which the royalists won 246

out of 370 seats in parliament.93 Venizelos admitted defeat and went into exile, though

he would still play a central part in Greek politics for yet another decade. It did not

take long after the royalist victory before a rigged plebiscite vote made sure of the

return of King Konstantinos I to the throne.

From the Treaty of Lausanne to the Second Hellenic Republic

The leader of the Turkish uprising in the early 1920s was General Mustafa Kemal,

also known as Atatürk. The uprising was a response to the landing of Greek troops in

Smyrna in 1919. The purpose of this army was to protect the Greek population in the

area from Turkish reprisals, but instead it resulted in the killing or wounding of

around 350 Turks, stirring Turkish national sentiment.94 The Greek military soon

faced defeat and displayed their willingness to negotiate, but Kemal responded with a

massive offensive that resulted in a Greek evacuation of Smyrna and the massacre of

close to 30,000 Greek and Armenian Christians.95

The Treaty of Lausanne marked the end of the Asia Minor debacle and the Greek-

Turkish war of 1922–23. The treaty would come to define the relationship both

between the military and the Greek government, and between Greece and the newly

independent modern Turkey. However, the treaty is also important if one wishes to

understand the building of a Greek nationality in the years that followed, especially

because it provided for an exchange of populations between Turkey and Greece. The

exchange was done on the basis of religion, and not according to language or culture,

92 Clogg 2013:95; Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:87. 93 ibid. 94 Clogg 2013:93. 95 ibid., 97.

38

creating large groups of Greek-speaking Muslims in Turkey, as well as large groups

of Turkish-speaking Orthodox Christians in Greece. In numbers, the period saw the

transfer of approximately 1,100,000 Greeks to the Greek Kingdom, whereas only

380,000 Muslims were transferred to Turkey in return.96

The exchange of populations, as well as the many refugees after the war created new

challenges for the Greek state. It was now close to an ethnically homogenous state,

and its borders contained all of the Greek populations in the Near East, with the

exception of the Italian-occupied Dodecanese Islands and Cyprus, which was now a

British possession. Yet there was no common nationality and so the cleavage in

society, the previously mentioned National Schism, deepened even further. In

September 1922 a group of officers friendly to Venizelos launched a coup headed by

Colonel Nikolaos Plastiras. And so, shortly before his death, Konstantinos I was yet

again ousted from the throne and driven into exile. According to Richard Clogg, the

‘bitterness and chaos of defeat were compounded by the feeling that Greece had been

abandoned in her hour of greatest need by traditional friends.’97 The result was a hunt

for scapegoats and eight politicians and soldiers were court-martialled for high

treason. Six of them were later executed by a firing squad. The ’Trial of the Six’ was

the torch that again put light to the fire between Venizelists and anti-Venizelists, a

feud that would go on throughout the inter-war period.

Many among the refugees and dispossessed populations of Greece were still loyal to

Venizelos, and in the referendum of 1924, many of the new inhabitants of Greece

voted for the abolition of the monarchy. By then, King George II, the eldest son of

Konstantinos I, had already left the country.98

96 ibid., 99. 97 ibid., 98. 98 ibid., 106.

39

1924–1949: Instability, war and military dictatorship

From the Second Hellenic Republic to the ‘Regime of the Fourth of

August’

Though the Second Hellenic Republic was proclaimed after the referendum of 1924,

the constitutional changes were not formally instituted until 1927, when a hero of the

Balkan wars, Admiral Koundouriotis, was elected president. During the intervening

years, General Theodore Pangalos had governed Greece in a military dictatorship.

After General Pangalos was overthrown by the military in 1926 new elections were

held in which a parliament with representatives of both Venizelists and anti-

Venizelists was elected. The new government paved the way for the return of

Eleftherios Venizelos who became prime minister in 1928. His time in office was now

mostly successful in the field of foreign policy, but he also put into practice an

electoral system based on majority, rather than proportional representation. The

majority system was effective in alienating smaller parties.

The short dictatorship of General Pangalos had resulted in a threat to go to war with

Turkey and an invasion of Bulgaria, but during the 1930s, Greece’s relationship with

its neighbours greatly improved. The Balkan Pact of 1934 was a mutual guarantee of

the existing frontiers of Greece, Yugoslavia, Romania and Turkey. Venizelos also

managed to establish peace between Turkey and Greece during the Ankara

Convention of 1930. Financially, the Great Crash of 1929 did not affect Greece to a

more significant degree than many other countries at the time. Even so, the state’s

economy was vulnerable due to its dependence on luxury exports such as currants and

olive oil, and in 1933 the government was forced to default on its interest payments of

foreign loans.99

In the election of 1932, Venizelos’ Liberal Party only held on to a marginal lead on

the People’s Party. A return to proportional representation resulted in a parliamentary

99 ibid., 107.

40

deadlock, and new elections – this time using the majority system – were held a year

later. This time the People’s Party and its allies secured a majority over the

Venizelists, a result unacceptable for Colonel Plastiras, who as a response tried to

force through the will of Venizelos by attempting a coup. The March 1933 coup

proved to be a failure and Colonel Plastiras was forced into exile. This was the start of

a highly unstable period in Greek politics, and again, the royalists were stirring.

Another failed coup in March 1935, this time headed by Venizelist officers and

supported by Venizelos himself, resulted in the exile of Venizelos. Martial law was

declared and the election was set to June the same year. The Venizelists chose to

abstain from the election in protest, and the election therefore resulted in a landslide

for the People’s Party, with 65 per cent of the votes resulting in 96 per cent of the

seats in Parliament, or 287 out of 300 seats.100 It should be mentioned that the

Communists in this election reached their highest per cent of the votes in the interwar

period, with almost 10 per cent, but because of the majority system they did not

receive any seats.101

The same year Prime Minister Tsaldaris resigned over the question of restoration of

the monarchy. The man who replaced him, Lieutenant Georgios Kondylis,

immediately abolished the republic and restored King George II to the throne after 12

years in exile. An election was again held in January 1936, under a system of

proportional representation, and as in 1932 it resulted in a deadlock between the

People’s Party and the Liberal Party. The inconclusive results left the Communists

with the balance of power with their hold of 6 per cent of the votes and 15 seats in

parliament, whereas the Liberal Party and People’s Party had 141 and 143 seats

respectively out of a total of 300 seats.102

When the minister of war, General Alexander Papagos, informed the king that the

army would not tolerate a government supported by the Communists, the king

100 ibid., 113; Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:102. 101 Clogg 2013:113. 102 ibid., 113; Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:103.

41

responded by immediately replacing him with Ioannis Metaxas. General Metaxas,

who soon after would become the prime minster, was the leader of the Freethinker’s

Party, Eleftherofrones, ‘an ultra-right-wing party even more marginal in terms of

electoral support than the communists.’103

The upcoming regime of the 4th of August was made possible in 1936, after the king,

under the influence of Metaxas, suspended a number of key articles of the

constitution. This was the beginning of General Metaxas’ dictatorship. In A Concise

History of Greece, Richard Clogg puts the dictatorship of Metaxas into a broader

context, comparing it with other dictatorial regimes at the time. Though described as

fascist, it was not as dynamic as German Nazism or Italian Fascism. General Metaxas

was not a fan of the political world, and his rule was authoritarian and backward-

looking. He was obsessed with a wish for instilling discipline into the Greek

population, and inspired by Hitler, he spoke of creating the ‘Third Hellenic

Civilisation’. Other similarities with other fascist regimes can be seen in the

establishment of a National Youth Organisation and the regimes focus on the ‘glory

days’ of ancient Greece, Sparta and Byzantium. It also shared a loathing of its

opposition on the far left. Despite this, the regime of Metaxas could be said to be

weaker than many other similar regimes. For instance, Metaxas did not physically

eliminate his opponents, but instead tried to create a climate of fear and used this to

neutralise the opposition.104 Later movements, like the 4th of August Party, have

explicitly used Metaxas as a symbol of change and inspiration.105

103 Clogg 2013:115; See also Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:104. 104 Clogg 2013:115-118; For more on authoritarianism in Greece and the rule of Metaxas see

Yannis Androcopoulos, ‘The Power Base of Greek Authoritarianism’, in Stein Uglevik Larsen, Bernt Hagtvet & Jan Petter Myklebust (eds.) Who were the Fascists. Social Roots of European Fascism, Bergen: Universitetsforlaget, 1980.

105 4th of August refers to the date of Metaxas coup d’état in 1936.

42

The Second World War: the ‘long night of barbarism’106

As Europe was entering into the Second World War, Metaxas hoped to keep Greece

out of the hostilities. This was increasingly difficult as Britain and Greece made

agreements for economic cooperation. In January 1940, both a war trade agreement

and a shipping agreement were signed between the two countries. In mid-August of

the same year, an Italian submarine torpedoed a Greek cruiser that partook in a

pilgrimage celebration of the Virgin Mary. Benito Mussolini wanted to use a war with

Greece to demonstrate to Germany that Italy was strong enough to win ‘spectacular

victories’.107 Two months later, on the 28th of October, the Italian Ambassador

delivered an ultimatum to Metaxas demanding the right of passage of Italian troops

through Greek territory. Metaxas refused, and met full support both in the population

and in the Greek government. The Greek army was not prepared for the imminent

Italian attack, but miraculously managed to push the Italian army back and into

Albanian territory.

Greece now found itself in a strange position. She was neither an ally of Britain nor at

war with Germany, yet the short Greek-Italian war was indirectly a part of the World

War on European soil. Britain had assured Greece that she would come to her

assistance if needed, but when asked for reinforcements a few days before the Italian

attack, Britain only said she would do her best. The Greek government wanted a

British military presence in Greece to help force Italy out of Albania and so create a

stronger foothold in the Balkan border towards Germany. Though Metaxas rejected a

British request to station air forces in Thessaloniki, out of fear of provoking Hitler, he

assured the British that Greece would help them against the Germans, but only after

they had defeated the Italians.

106 The ‘long night of barbarism’ was a phrase used by Churchill to describe the years to come in his first broadcast as prime minister during the war, on the 19th of May 1940. The whole speech can be found here: www.winstonchurchill.org/learn/speeches/speeches-of-winston-churchill/91-be-ye-men-of-valour [24.01.2014].

107 Clogg 2013:118.

43

Greece under German occupation

Greece’s relationship with Britain posed a threat for Hitler, who wished to secure his

Balkan flank, preparing for the invasion of the Soviet Union. On the 6th of April 1941,

Hitler therefore invaded Greece and rapidly overcame both British and Greek troops.

The devastating defeat led to the suicide of Prime Minister Alexandros Koryzis who

had taken over after the death of Metaxas in late January. The prime minister who

took office after the death of Koryzis, Emmanouil Tsouderos, was a known opponent

of the regime of Metaxas.

Hitler’s attack on Greece, under the code name ‘Maritsa’, was a great success, and

Athens fell on the 23rd of April. King George II, his government and some Greek

forces had then managed to withdraw to the island of Crete, and hoped to join British

forces in their defence of the island. Crete was intended as a base for air raids on oil

fields in Romania, thereby destroying an important source for German fuel supplies.

The defence of the island only lasted a month, and at the end of May, after fierce

fighting, Crete fell, and the king and his government withdrew to the Middle East.

Three days before the fall of Athens and without government approval, General

Georgios Tsolakoglou had tried to negotiate an armistice with the Germans. After the

fall of Crete he was to become the head of a collaborationist government. It did not

take long before Greece was under a tripartite German, Italian and Bulgarian

occupation.

Financially Greece was not prepared for the increased expenses related to military

preparations that were rendered necessary as the war in Europe intensified. The

financial burden, which was met with a war lottery, increased taxation, and British

loans without specific terms of repayment, would come to dominate and define the

Greek economy for years to come. 108 During the tripartite occupation Greece

experienced food shortages and massive inflation, and suffering under the harsh

108 Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:110.

44

policies of the occupying powers, Greece underwent a devastating famine in the

winter of 1941–2, which resulted in the deaths of 100,000 people.109

Greek resistance

The Greeks were not, however, without the will to resist. The Greek Communist Party

(KKE) was soon to become the leading force in Greek resistance towards the

occupying forces. In September 1941, the National Liberation Front (EAM) was

established to organise the resistance, and the Greek People’s Liberation Army

(ELAS) 110 was established as its military arm. EAM also established National

Solidarity, an organisation for relief of victims of the occupation, and a youth

movement known as EPON. According to Richard Clogg, the traditional ‘political

world’ was unwilling at the time to offer leadership because of a political void that

had developed during the dictatorship.111 The Communists were quick to fill this

vacuum. Even so, it is worth noting that the majority of the members of EAM and

ELAS were not communists, and non-communist resistance groups, like Ethnikos

Dimokratikos Ellinikos Syndesmos (the National Democratic Hellenic League,

EDES), were also established. EAM provided substantial help to the Greek population

during the above-mentioned famine of 1941–2.

The quisling government of General Tsolakoglou has been described as the puppet,

first of Italy and then of Germany, but the war was soon to turn in favour of the

Allies.112 In April 1943, Ioannis Rallis assumed the office of prime minister, and his

establishment of the ‘Security Battalions’, led by Venizelist officers, soon turned into

a counterattack against the resistance of EAM–ELAS. Many of the previously leading

politicians, as well as Britain, were determined to keep Greece out of the hands of the

Communists, and the ‘Security Battalion’ did not only consist of collaborators, but

also of those who feared the power of the communists.

109 Clogg 2013:121. 110 ELAS is sometimes also called the National People’s Liberation Army. 111 Clogg 2013:123. 112 Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:113.

45

Armed bands of both communists and non-communists had taken to the mountains

and started a guerrilla war against the occupying power. Britain wished to coordinate

the Greek opposition, but met resistance because of Churchill’s support for the return

of the king. As should be remembered, the king had supported Britain at the start of

the war. The ‘National Bands’ agreement in July 1943 created a joint general

headquarters in which EAM–ELAS enjoyed a majority in numbers. Even so, there did

not seem to be much agreement between the guerrilla, the British military and

political authorities, the king and the government in exile. The guerrilla wished to stay

in control of Greece, and wanted to exercise power over a number of key ministries in

the exile government. They also wished that the king would stay in exile until a

plebiscite had voted for his return. In October, ELAS attacked the anti-communist

organisation EDES on suspicion of collaboration with the occupying powers. The

warring resistance groups finally managed to enter a truce in February 1944. EAM

then established a Political Committee of National Liberation with the purpose of

exercising government over what was considered the free ‘Mountain’ Greece. This

resulted in mutinies of EAM sympathisers in the Greek armed forces that were

stationed with the exiled government in Egypt.

As in many of the significant events in the history of modern Greece, it was the Great

Powers that came to decide the fate of the nation towards the end of the war. The

famous ‘percentages agreement’ between Stalin and Churchill in October 1944 gave

Britain 90 per cent of the say in post-war Greece, in return for Russian predominance

in Romania.

The Greek Civil War

Georgios Papandreou was installed as the new prime minister of the exiled

government in 1944. As a known Venizelist and anti-communist, he was greatly

favoured by the British, and with their support, he took it upon himself to create a

government of national unity at a conference in Lebanon. The conference ended in

46

deadlock because of an under-representation of the communists, who demanded the

resignation of Papandreou and the control of key ministries as the price for their

participation in the government. In August, however, EAM chose to back down.

The Greece that Papandreou returned to in October 1944 was a Greece marked by

years of war and occupation, and can perhaps best be described with the words of

Mark Mazower:

A few days after the Germans left, in late 1944, an American OSS agent drove across the

Peloponnese, filming whatever he found. In contrast with the waving, jubilant crowds who

greeted Allied troops in France, the people he met in Greece seemed tense and exhausted. The

clothes hung off their bodies, and many were barefoot. Everywhere he found signs of

malnutrition, disease and destruction. [...] Perhaps the eeriest sequence shows a small town in

the mountains. […] A line of women, dressed in black, can be seen moving slowly down a

road shaded by cypresses. From the cameraman’s notes, we find that this was Kalvryta, in the

northern Peloponnese, almost exactly one year after all the men in the town had been shot by

Wehrmacht soldiers.113

Upon arrival, Papandreou had three main problems. First, he had to find a way to

satisfy the left’s need for justice for the collaborationists. Second, he had to stabilise

an economy starting of decay. And third, he had to demobilise and replace the

guerrilla armies with a national army. As has been seen in other nations torn by war,

victory requires justice and scapegoats. The Germans were leaving, but the fight

between EAM–ELAS and the Security Battalion continued. There are also reports of

massacres. Koliopoulos and Veremis writes:

Between September 8 and 15 [1944] wholesale massacres of units accused of collaboration

with the Germans took place in the Peleponnese. In Meligala, a village close to Kalamata,

EAM-ELAS forces allegedly executed about 1,800 people.114

113 Mark Mazower, Inside Hitler’s Greece. The Experience of Occupation, 1941-44, New Haven/London: Yale Nota Bene/Yale University Press, 1993:xii.

114 Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:114.

47

At the time, the ELAS forces amounted to some 60,000 men and women, and though

under British control, they constituted a significant threat to the new government.

Even though an agreement seemed to have been made for demobilisation, the civil

war within the resistance had created an atmosphere of suspicion, and ELAS soon

feared that Papandreou would not hold his part of the agreement. EAM’s nominees

soon resigned from the cabinet and organised mass demonstrations that resulted in the

loss of fifteen lives.115 The Battle of Athens ended with British intervention in January

1945. Though ELAS now agreed to disarm, the left-wing terror against political

opponents during the years of occupation was not forgotten, and the uproar in

December had stirred ultra-right-wingers who were now set on a brutal revenge on the

left.

Churchill managed to persuade King George II to stand down in favour of Archbishop

Damaskinos, and General Plastiras replaced Papandreou as prime minister, but was

soon replaced again by Themistoklis Sophoulis, who announced that the first election

since 1936 was to be held the 31st of March 1946 and followed by a plebiscite. The

Greek state was in disorder, and many on the left decided to abstain from the election.

This resulted in victory for a right-wing coalition dominated by the People’s Party and

headed by Konstantinos ‘Dino’ Tsaldaris with 55 per cent of the popular vote.116 The

right-wing populists and their allies won 206 out of the 354 seats in parliament.117 The

following plebiscite in September 1946 resulted in a 68 per cent vote for the return of

the king.118 The right-wing government stood in opposition to the communists that

were driven as guerrillas up into the mountains. In October the communists

announced the establishment of the Democratic Army.

In 1947, President Truman wanted to provide Greece with emergency aid through the

Truman Doctrine. Britain had by then decided to loosen its grip on Greek politics and

115 Clogg 2013:134. 116 ibid., 135. 117 Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:119. 118 Clogg 2013:135.

48

instead leave affairs in the hands of the United States. Greece was at the time deeply

involved in a civil war between the Democratic Army and the regular army. The KKE

was banned in December, but the Democratic Army received significant support from

the communist regimes of Yugoslavia, Bulgaria and Albania, and at the end of 1947

they announced the formation of the Provisional Democratic Government. However,

they stood against a national army supported by the United States, and though the

Democratic Army managed to effectively recruit new troops in the areas they

controlled, it proved not to be enough. In 1948, Yugoslavia was expelled from the

Communist Information Bureau (COMINFORM), among other things because of

their criticism of Russia’s failure to support the fighting Greek communists in the civil

war.119 Despite this show of Yugoslavian support, the Greek communists decided to

side with Moscow in the matter. This resulted in the loss of support from Yugoslavia,

and in 1949, the Yugoslavian border was completely closed off to the Democratic

Army. Eventually, the Army was forced deep into Albania by the US trained regular

army, and by the end of 1949; the civil war was officially over.

Many have tried to interpret the intentions of the leaders on both left and right as the

nation slid into civil war. The KKE had been in charge for most of the occupation, and

it is not unlikely that they had trouble giving that power away upon Prime Minister

Papandreou’s return in 1944. Initial motives have also been discussed. David Close

has highlighted mistrust as the driving force behind KKE’s decisions.120 The Battle of

Athens in December 1944 had turned in the communists’ disfavour, and resulted in a

retaliatory attitude among many right-wing populists. This was also to play a role in

the politics of Prime Minister Konstantinos Tsaldaris during the civil war, and also at

the end of the war when at least 5,000 guerrillas were executed upon their capture.121

It has already been mentioned that during the war, EAM–ELAS recruited heavily both

from non-communist and communist sympathisers. Though not directly a

119 Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:121. 120 ibid., 116; see also David Close, Origins of the Greek Civil War, London: Longman, 1995. 121 Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:125.

49

continuation of EAM–ELAS, the Democratic Army also recruited people with

different motivations. In fact, the majority of the members in 1947 and 1948 were

Slav Macedonians, and Yugoslavian archives and papers from the KKE have shown

that many within the Democratic Army had nationalist and secessionist ambitions for

a separate Macedonian state with Thessaloniki as its capital.122

Greek nationalism and the Megali Idea, 1821-1949

Nationalism and identity

One of the leading historians in the early days of modern Greece was Konstantinos

Paparrigopoulos (1815-91). In his life’s work, History of the Hellenic Nation, he

pointed to the fact that none of the European nations had ever in history been

ethnically pure. Instead he argued that despite the Greeks being a young people, and

therefore unable to claim a racial continuity, there is a cultural continuity of the

Greeks.123 This was highlighted after the creation of the Greek state and the choice of

Athens as the capital of the kingdom in 1834. Though at the time only a dusty village,

the village that housed the ruins of the Parthenon was to become a symbol of the

kingdom’s orientation towards its cultural heritage from the classical era.

The modern Greek identity defined the Greek nation as ‘a cultural community

embracing all the linguistic groups that the Greeks have incorporated and absorbed in

their history.’124 Even so, one cannot exaggerate the role of the language as a major

instrument of acculturation into Greek citizenship. As Koliopoulos and Veremis write,

‘[t]he role of the modern state with its uniform educational system has been

paramount in shaping national identity and national consciousness.’125 Katharevousa

(which literally means ‘pure’), a more conservative version of Greek resembling the

122 ibid. 121; Clogg 2013. 123 Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:2. 124 ibid., 8. 125 ibid., 4.

50

old Greek, was soon to become the main language at the university of Athens, and

was also the taught language in the general education system. Katharevousa was

created as a compromise between ancient Greek and the spoken Dimotiki, or Demotic

Greek. Modern Greek was transformed through a gradual adaption of more oral and

modern terms, into the formal Katharevousa. The question of language would be a

recurring theme until Andreas Papandreou in 1981 abolished the use of Katharevousa

entirely. Today it is usually only used by the Greek-Orthodox church.

The Megali Idea

Modern Greece is built upon nationalistic projects, with the perhaps most important

one being the Megali Idea. The Megali Idea, or Great Idea, governed Greek politics

throughout the 19th century, and were not abandoned until well into the 20th century.

As an expansionist project, the main goal was to incorporate all the areas which

historically belonged Greece, going back to Alexander the Great. Benedict Anderson

has tried to capture these strong nationalist sentiments in Greece. In his work

Imagined Communities he writes about how the increase in discovery and conquest

led to a revolution in European ideas about language. 126 This ‘lexicographic

revolution’ led scholars to search beyond their own borders. During the 18th century,

German, French and English scholars began to make the Greek classics available to a

larger public, and stories of the ancient Hellenic civilisation were made increasingly

accessible to ‘a small number of young Greek-speaking Christian Intellectuals’ who

had studied or travelled ‘beyond the confines of the Ottoman Empire.’127 One of these

men, Adamantios Koraes, also known as the father of Katharevousa, says:

For the first time the nation surveys the hideous spectacle of its ignorance and trembles in

measuring with the eye the distance separating it from its ancestors’ glorious past. This

painful discovery, however, does not precipitate the Greeks into despair: We are the

126 Anderson 2006[1983]. 127 ibid., 72.

51

descendants of Greeks, they implicitly told themselves, we must either try to become again

worthy of this name, or we must not bear it.128

According to Anderson, these young men strived to ‘debarbarise’ the modern Greeks,

making them worthy of Socrates and Pericles. The movements resulted in the Greek

War of Independence, but it did not end there. The Megali Idea has continued to lead

to severe tension between Greece and its neighbouring countries up until this day. It

may also explain the later tension that occurred regarding the name of Macedonia,

when this northern neighbour of Greece became independent upon the dissolution of

Yugoslavia in 1991. I will return to this in Chapter 5.

Cleavages in politics

It is not possible to understand the more recent developments in Greece without

understanding the period between 1821 and 1949. The first long century of Greece as

an independent state was dominated by war and severe political cleavages. The first

cleavage was between royalists and republicans. This went on for several years, with

intermittent periods of restoration of the kingdom between dictatorship and republic.

This divide officially ended with the final abolition of the monarchy in 1973. The

second cleavage was between Venizelists and anti-Venizelists. Even to this day,

Eleftherios Venizelos is considered one of the most influential men in modern Greek

history. This divide was soon to be supplanted by a third cleavage, between the

communists and the military. This cleavage is perhaps one of the best examples of

how Greek politics has been dominated by a strong polarisation and contrasting

policies. There are two things that highlight this phenomenon. The first is the strong

connection between the military and the political right. The second is the increase in

the establishment of parties to the left. These two contrast each other in the sense that

as one increases, so too does the other.

128 ibid.

52

Inspired by the ideals of the French revolution, the 19th century had seen the creation

of many nation-states and revolutions, and in the years that followed the establishment

of the Greek state there was also a significant change in Greek nationalism. As

previously mentioned, the building of both the Greek nation and the Greek nationality

were key aspects during the period from independence to the civil wars, and the

struggle to define who belonged to the Greek state would come to influence the next

sixty years as well. As we have seen, the Greek state is built upon nationalist projects,

and it is these projects that echo in the developments that followed in the last half of

the 20th century.

53

4 1949–1990: European Integration

1949–1974: Reconstruction and coup d’état

Foreign relations and the case of Cyprus

The period after the end of the civil war in 1949 was greatly marked by the American

presence. The Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan had provided Greece with

emergency aid since 1947. Economic reconstruction was to be the priority for years to

come. Around half of the state’s investment expenditure was based on American aid

between 1947 and 1957.129 To counter inflation, the drachma was devalued in 1953; a

measure that again made Greece competitive in foreign markets.130

To the north, Albania, Yugoslavia and Bulgaria had fallen under communist control.

To stop further communist advancement to the south, both Greece and Turkey were

admitted to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) in 1952. Though neither

of the countries could be considered ‘North Altlantic’, the civil war in Greece and the

fight between communists and anti-communists may be seen as a part of the Cold

War.

The island of Cyprus was also to shape the politics of this period. The case of Cyprus

can be seen as a symbol of the difficult relationship between Greece and its neighbour

Turkey that persists to this day. The island came under British administration in 1878

and was made part of the crown colonies in 1925. The island’s population was mainly

Greeks and Turks, with the Greeks making up the majority. The Greek community

had for a long time expressed wishes for a reunification with their Greek motherland,

but now the Greek Cypriot aspirations became clearer. In 1955 a campaign of civil

disobedience was unleashed, backed up by political violence. The Turks countered

129 Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:130. 130 ibid.; Clogg 2013:145.

54

with demands for partition. In 1958, the president of Cyprus, Archbishop Makarios,

made it clear that he considered pushing for Cypriot independence instead of

unification with mainland Greece. Eventually, a settlement was reached between

Greece, Turkey and Britain providing Cyprus with her independence as a republic

within the British Commonwealth. Britain was still allowed to keep dominion over

two areas, the military bases of Akrotiri and Dhekelia, and both Greece and Turkey

were allowed to station a small military presence on the island. But the Cyprus

settlement of 1960 proved to be short-lived. Some claimed that the system of power-

sharing had granted the Turkish minority too much power. In November 1963

Archbishop Makarios demanded, on behalf of the Greek Cypriots, that this power be

reduced. This was rejected by the Turkish government, and at the end of December

fierce fighting between the populations on the island made Turkey threaten to

intervene. In the end it was the subtle threats of American President Lyndon B.

Johnson that put an end to the hostilities.131 A United Nation peacekeeping force was

set in to maintain the peace, and at the time of writing, it still has not left.

From reconstruction to revolution

The post-war period saw an increase in the involvement of different parties in national

politics. Martial law was in force between 1947 and 1950, so the first election after the

civil war therefore took place in 1950 under a system of proportional representation.

This is one of the first elections in which it became clear that it was personalities

rather than principles that seemed to count for the voters. As I will later argue, this is

both a permanent and a prominent feature of Greek politics even to this day.

Going back to the elections of 1950, parties that identified themselves at the political

centre won a significant number of the seats in a parliament of 250. The Liberal Party,

led by Sofoklis Venizelos, the second son of Eleftherios Venizelos, won 56 seats; the

new National Progressive Centre Union (EPEK), led by Nikolaos Plastiras, won 45

seats; and the Georgios Papandreou Party won 35 seats. The Communists had been

131 Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:139.

55

banned since 1947, but were represented through the Democratic Front, which won 18

seats, whereas the populist People’s Party, still under the leadership of Konstantinos

Tsaldaris, remained the largest party with 62 seats.132

The government did not last long and new elections were held a year later. The

election of September 1951 saw the debut of two new fractions: the Greek Rally,

headed by Marshal Papagos, who had been commander-in-chief at the end of the civil

war, and the United Democratic Left, closely associated with the banned KKE. The

Greek Rally replaced the People’s Party on the right, with a significant proportion of

the army vote, but inconclusive results still led to a new centre coalition, to the dismay

of the American ambassador, who threatened to reduce American financial aid unless

elections were held under a majority system.133 This was done in the election of

November 1952, which resulted in a major victory for the Greek Rally, which secured

247 out of 300 seats with 49 per cent of the vote.134

After the death of Marshal Papagos, King Paul, the brother of George II who had

succeeded him upon his death in 1947, chose Konstantinos Karamanlis as his

successor. Karamanlis changed the Greek Rally into the National Radical Union and

held a new election in February 1956. Karamanlis’ party won a majority in the

parliament, but in the election of 1958 the front organisation of the banned

Communist party, United Democratic Left, emerged as the main opposition party.

Again the political stage seemed marked by the fight between communists and anti-

communists. Some have suggested that this sudden rise in the popular vote for the left

was due to problems at the centre.135 Whether this was the case or not, the centre made

sure of their comeback in the election in 1961.

132 ibid., 128. 133 Clogg 2013:144. 134 ibid., 144, 289; Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:130. 135 See Clogg 2013:148.

56

After the election of 1958, the centre parties had joined forces and created the Centre

Union, headed by Georgios Papandreou. Papandreou’s coalition succeeded in creating

an alternative to the United Democratic Left, and the supporters of the Centre Union

ranged from the far right to the far left. In spite of this, Karamanlis and the National

Radical Union still came out as the victors of the 1961 elections. Both the Centre

Union and the United Democratic Left maintained that the results were manipulated

and claimed that people had felt pressured by the army or other forces. Furthermore,

they accused the army for having implemented a NATO plan, code-named ‘Pericles’,

and said it was designed to deal with internal security threats and to strengthen the

hold of power of the right.136 Though never proved at the time, the Pericles plan was

to become important in the later colonels’ coup.137

In 1963, Georgios Papandreou managed to secure a narrow victory over Karamanlis,

who was struggling after a fallout with the royal house. Karamanlis had in fact

resigned and left the country to a caretaker government, and returned only to

participate in the elections. Though victorious, Papandreou’s suspicion towards the

United Democratic Left, who now held the balance of power in government, made

him resign. New elections were therefore held in February 1964, this time benefitting

Papandreou and the centre, which gained a 53 per cent share of the vote.138

Papandreou’s time in office was to be short, though, and overshadowed by the

troubles on the island of Cyprus and of economic development. He relied heavily on

the advice of his son, Andreas, who was more radical than his father.139 In 1965,

Papandreou went to the new king, Konstantinos II, who had ascended the throne after

the death of his father, King Paul, in 1964, and asked to be given greater control over

the army and the ministry of defence. He was rejected on the grounds that his son was

136 ibid., 152. 137 Close 2002:109. 138 Clogg 2013:155. 139 See Andreas Papandreou, Democracy at Gunpoint: The Greek Front, New York/Toronto:

Doubleday, 1970.

57

under investigation, accused of being involved with a conspiratorial group within the

army, known as Aspida, or Shield. Instead King Konstantinos II sacked the prime

minister on the 15th of July 1965. Little did the king know of the consequences of his

actions. Tension ran high in the population and supporters of Papandreou took to the

streets in massive protests.

In 1966, Papandreou and the leader of the National Radical Union, Panayiotis

Kanellopoulos, reached an agreement with the king with the purpose of trying to

stabilise the government. They agreed that new elections in May 1967 were the best

solution to this political crisis. Richard Clogg describes the tension at the time in the

following words: ‘[T]he continuing political turmoil and uncertainty served to feed the

paranoia of the extra-parliamentary right and to create a dangerous climate of

disillusionment with politicians among the population at large.’140 This uncertain and

disillusioned climate is perhaps what best explains what happened next.

Coup d’état: The military Junta

Out of fear of a new victory for Papandreou, the military, led by a group of colonels,

decided to stop the elections and successfully staged a coup on the 21st of April 1967.

The three engineers of the coup were Colonel Georgios Papadopoulos, Nikolaos

Makarezos and Stylianos Pattakos. For many years, Papadopoulos’ main

preoccupation was to ensure that control of the state remained out of the hands of

communists. As many officers of the army had lost confidence in the crown, plans

were made for a takeover. The conspirators approached the king and asked him to

appoint a puppet government, leaving the power in the hands of Papadopoulos. Over

the following weeks thousands of people were put under house arrest, jailed or

deported to prison islands. Many prominent politicians were also arrested.141

140 Clogg 2013:159. 141 Close 2002:114.

58

The regime of the colonels, or just Junta (Greek: Χούντα), as the dictatorship was to

be called, was set on revenge. Many have discussed why the Junta wished to take

over, and though explanations range from defending ‘the traditional values of

“Helleno-Christian civilisation” from the western and secular influences’ 142 to

displeasure with the result of the civil war143, it is clear that the coup was carried out

under the pretence of an imminent communist takeover, similar to what had been done

under the regime of Metaxas some 30 years earlier. The Junta soon took up the

ambitious programme of rejuvenating Greece, creating a utopia where ‘social classes

would be abolished and general consensus on vital issues would be arrived at through

systematic training in whatever was deemed expedient for the nation.’144 Their

ideology was not unlike that of other far right regimes, and it could perhaps best be

described as a sort of self-taught fascism.

The Junta was highly unpopular, and its support base was fragile. In fact, the majority

of politicians at both ends of the spectre, with the exception of the extreme right,

opposed the regime. Despite this, there was little organised opposition within Greek

borders, at least until the regime started to deteriorate in 1973. In March, students

occupied the Law Faculty of the University of Athens. Papadopoulos’ response was to

dethrone King Konstantinos II, who had lived in exile in Rome, and in his place he

proclaimed a presidential parliamentary republic. In the referendum that followed,

Papadopoulos, as the only candidate, was elected president for an eight-year term.

Again the students took to the streets, and in November they managed to occupy the

university institution known as Athens Polytechnic. However, these actions were

brutally supressed by the army, and the occupation ended after two days, on the 17th

of November 1973, when a tank crashed through the main gate. Possibly as many as

7,000 people were arrested and hundreds were wounded. It has not been possible to

ascertain the total number of deaths, but it could be close to 80.145 His own supporters

142 Clogg 2013:160. 143 Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:141. 144 ibid., 142. 145 Close 2002:122.

59

replaced Papadopoulos soon after as Dimitrios Ioannidis assumed leadership, with

Lieutenant-General Phaidon Gizikis as president.

In the end, the lack of support and legitimacy of the Ioannidis regime led to the

downfall of the Junta, and Konstantinos Karamanlis was brought back to oversee the

return to democratic government, assuming the office of prime minister on the 24th of

July 1974.

1975–1990: The Metapolitefsi and two-party politics

Rebuilding democracy

In Greece, the rebuilding of society after the overthrow of the Junta is referred to as

the Metapolitefsi (Greek: Μεταπολίτευση), literally meaning ‘regime change’. Many

have written about this period and the sudden transformation from military

dictatorship to being one of the more stable democracies in Europe at the beginning of

the 1980s.146 As we have seen, the political system in Greece had for a long time been

dominated by cleavages between royalists and republicans, Venizelists and anti-

Venizelists, and between communists and anti-communists. It was only at the end of

the Second World War that one heard talk of the establishment of a political centre as

an addition to the traditional left and right. Most of the parties were created out of a

will for political or cultural change, and not out of a general ‘need’ in the population.

According to Ole Smith, the role of the politician has been that of a messenger

between the population and the bureaucracy who should in principle be able to

provide for his supporters whether they were in need of a phone or a pension.147

Personal issues were therefore essential as the Greeks entered the election booths

where they usually voted for personalities rather than specific issues, a tendency

already noticeable in other elections following the civil war. The system resembled

146 ibid., 141; See Ole L. Smith, Fra militærdiktatur til socialisme. Grækenland 1974-1983,

Museum Tusculanums Forlag: København, 1984. 147 Smith 1984:115.

60

the old patron-client relationship, where support in the elections obliged a politician to

help his elector if asked.

New Democracy vs. PASOK

Konstantinos Karamanlis wanted to legitimise his sudden power as soon as possible,

and therefore called for elections in November 1974. Before this election, there were

three primary issues that concerned the electorate: establishing a democracy;

terminating the dependence on foreign, and of late American, aid in foreign affairs;

and greater social justice.148 There are also two other things that should be noted about

this election. First of all, the election featured parties from the full political spectrum.

Karamanlis had even used the increasing tolerance in the population after the

overthrow of the Junta to remove the ban on the Communist Party. Second, two

parties emerged for the election that would play a significant part in Greek politics for

the decades to come. The first was Karamanlis’ newly established New Democracy

(ND), a recreation of the previous National Radical Union. The second was the

Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK), the party of Andreas Papandreou. Not to

anyone’s surprise, New Democracy gained the majority with 54 per cent, translated

into 219 out of 300 seats in Parliament.149 The following referendum on the future of

the monarchy resulted in a close to 70–30 margin in favour of a republic, and in 1975

the Parliament elected Konstantinos Tsatsos as president.150

New Democracy was to keep the majority of the popular vote after the parliamentary

elections of 1977, though it had decreased from the last election. In 1980, Karamanlis

was chosen to succeed Tsatsos as president, thereby leaving the office of prime

minister to George Rallis. Karamanlis had for a long time worked to strengthen

Greece’s bonds with Europe. In 1961, Prime Minister Karamanlis successfully

managed to negotiate an association agreement with the European Economic

148 Close 2002:152. 149 Clogg 2013:168. 150 Close 2002:142; Clogg 2013:169.

61

Community. Twenty years later, in 1981, Greece became the tenth member of the

European Community (EU).

Both organisation and democratisation proved to be important for parties if they were

to retain their positions. Papandreou seemed well aware of this, and worked hard to

establish a softer line, trying to appeal to voters from the centre and the more radical

voters in New Democracy. Promoting the slogan Allagi (change), PASOK appealed

evenly to both men and women, to both rural and urban areas, and it cut across social

classes.151 ND, on the other hand, had relied too much on Karamanlis, who was

unable to carry out the reforms necessary to modernise his party. The leadership of

ND was therefore given to George Rallis, but the absence of Karamanlis’ charismatic

leadership weakened the party. The many years of persecution of the left, and

especially of communists, had created a fear of the police, but with the policies of

Karamanlis this fear had now gradually started to decrease. The removal of the ban on

KKE made the left a more prominent force in Greek politics. In the elections of 1981

PASOK won 172 out of 300 seats, yielding the first socialist government, and

Andreas Papandreou became prime minister.

The elections of 1985 were preceded by the end of Karamanlis’ period as president in

March. It was generally assumed that he would continue for a second term, but despite

having previously praised Karamanlis’ role as president, Papandreou now went

against him as PASOK launched the candidacy of the younger Christos Sartzetakis

instead. After three rounds of voting, Sartzetakis finally received the necessary

minimum of 180 votes in parliament. 152 PASOK then introduced constitutional

amendments that enhanced the powers of the prime minister in relation to those of the

president. The parliamentary elections later that year therefore turned into a

confrontation between ND and PASOK, but PASOK retained approximately the same

151 Clogg 2013:178–180. 152 ibid., 193.

62

majority as it had in the elections of 1981 with 46 per cent, whereas ND increased its

share of the vote by five percentage points, gaining 41 per cent of the vote.153

The year of 1989 saw two elections, both ending in a deadlock. The leader of ND was

now Konstantinos Mitsotakis, who had made a mark for himself in Greek politics as

the rival of Papandreou. Papandreou quickly accused him of being a traitor who,

amongst other things, bore a major responsibility for the Junta.154 The popularity of

Papandreou was suddenly falling in the run-up to the elections. Papandreou had health

issues and spent some time in hospitals abroad. He also decided to divorce his wife to

marry a significantly younger Olympic Airways hostess. As Papandreou came to

realise that PASOK would probably decrease its popular vote in the elections, he

made sure to introduce a more purely proportional electoral system as one of his last

acts in government. The effect of this was seen in the June elections of 1989 where the

majority of 44 per cent of the vote only resulted in 144 seats in Parliament for New

Democracy, whereas PASOK won 39 per cent and 125 seats. The ‘Alliance of the

Left and of Progress’, an alliance between the Communist Party and the Greek Left,

gained 13 per cent, and therefore held the balance of power.155 New elections did not

provide a significant change in the results. The inability to come to terms and establish

a coalition government made new elections seem inevitable. After long negotiations,

an all-party government was formed headed by a non-political figure, Xenophon

Zolotas. This ‘ecumenical’ government was to remain in office until new elections

could be held in April 1990. In this election ND emerged as the winner with 47 per

cent and 150 seats in Parliament, with Konstantinos Mitsotakis becoming prime

minister.156 A month later, Konstantinos Karamanlis was elected president for a

second term.

153 ibid., 194. 154 ibid., 190. 155 ibid., 196–7. 156 ibid., 199.

63

Cyprus towards the new millenium

The 1980s saw significant changes, and a greater Greek presence, in international

affairs. In 1983, two years after her accession, Greece took over the presidency of the

EU. The 1980s also saw a reduction of the US military presence in Greece. As for

Cyprus, the situation had become increasingly tense just as the Junta had started to

disintegrate. The Cypriot president, Archbishop Makarios demanded the removal of

Greek troops from the island after Ioannidis tried to force Makarios to accept Athens

as the national centre of Hellenism. Ioannidis responded by launching a coup against

the president. This resulted in a Turkish response in the form of an invasion of the

northern part of the island in 1974. War was imminent between the two neighbours as

both started to mobilise. This became the first crisis in Karamanlis’ new term in

office. In 1983, the Turkish Cypriot assembly unilaterally declared an independent

‘Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus’. Though formally only recognised by Turkey,

the incident worsened the relationship between Greece and Turkey. The partition of

Cyprus had created two independent states, and clashes occurred frequently between

Greek and Turkish Cypriots during the 1990s, and the division remains to this day.

The Greek part of Cyprus became a member of the EU in 2004.

The Greek electoral system

Before further assessing the developments from 1990 to 2014 a note should be made

on the Greek electoral system. Generally it is the sitting majority party that call for

elections and also chooses what electoral system should be used. The custom has been

to vary between a majority system and a system of proportional representation,

usually depending on what would most benefit the incumbent majority. An example

of how the electoral law could be used to the governing party’s advantage is the

election of 1956. Here the electoral law created a system that gave Karamanlis’ party

the majority in the parliament, even though the opposition received a marginally

larger share of the popular vote.

64

Recently, the most common electoral system used in Greece has been a combination

of a majority system and a system of proportional representation. After parliamentary

elections, the parties that wish to form a coalition need to hold half of the seats in

parliament plus one, or 151 out of 300 seats. The seats are distributed in the following

manner: 250 of the seats are distributed on the basis of proportional representation.

The last 50 are given to the party that wins the plurality of the votes. This system

helps create a system where ‘the winner takes it all’. There is also a 3 per cent

threshold for parties to be considered in the race for seats.

The Greek electoral system has long suffered from high levels of corruption, populism

and also, as I suggested earlier, clientelism. As the new millennium approached, the

fear of the police again became a prominent feature in the population. In 2008, the

police shot and killed a 15-year-old boy. The incident and the youth riots that

followed not only support the claim that there was a scepticism towards the police as

figures of authority, but also the imminent political crisis. There was a call for radical

political change, and whether this change was offered from the right or from the left

was not a matter of great importance.157

157 See also Ellinas 2012.

65

5 1990–2014: The Financial Crisis

Greece entered the European Community (EU) in 1981. This was despite the fact that

a Commission report from 1976/7 had clearly stated that Greece was absolutely not

prepared economically for such a commitment.158 The decision to grant Greece

membership should rather be seen as purely political. The main motivation for the

Community to accept Greek accession was to help stabilise and consolidate the

emerging democracy after a period of ‘right-wing dictatorship’.159 The same could be

seen in other new member states, such as Spain and Portugal that became members in

1986, and it was also later repeated, though less hastily, in Eastern Europe. Greece

had long sought to maintain a stronger bond with the European states. This can

perhaps be seen as a withdrawal towards the north and west after a long time under

the shadow of the Ottoman Empire to the south and east.

The question of Macedonia Greek foreign affairs during the last decade of the 20th century were also marked by

the unstable states at the northern border, Albania, Yugoslavia and Bulgaria. Albania

had a large Greek minority in the south. A sudden exodus in 1991 gave rise to fears

that the Albanian government was forcing the minority to leave, but at the same time,

large groups of Albanians who were not of Greek origin also crossed the border to the

south to find work in Greece, most of them illegally. The borders of the Soviet Union

had been closed for years, and now Greece also saw a significant increase in

immigration of Greek minorities from the former Union. Macedonia also achieved its

independence with the dissolution of Yugoslavia, and EU members soon opened

diplomatic relations with the new state. This was met by fury in Greece, as I briefly

noted in chapter 3. Greece refused to accept a name that did not include a reference to

158 Béatrice Hibou, ‘Greece and Portugal: Convergent or Divergent Europeanization?’, in Simon

Bulmer & Christian Lequesne (eds.) The Member States of the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005:231.

159 Michelle Cini & Nieves Pérez-Solórzano Borragán. European Union Politics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010:420.

66

its previous union. The name Former Yugoslavian Republic of Macedonia (FYROM)

was therefore decided upon as this separated this newly established republic from the

old claim Greece had over the name and geographical area of the historical Macedonia

of Alexander the Great. For the same reason, Greece has greatly opposed Macedonian

membership in the European Union. The Macedonian demonstrations are also

mentioned by Dimitris Psarras as a factor for the increase in support for the far right in

the 1990s.160

In February 1994, Papandreou announced a blockade of Macedonia. Interpreting this

as a breach with the laws of the community, the EU Commission complained to the

European Court of Justice. The issue reached its peak in 1995, when the Greek foreign

minister refused to attend the ceremony to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the

liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp, because the Macedonian flag was to

be flown alongside the flags of other countries that also lost nationals in the death

camp.161 Relations improved in 1995, and Greece eventually agreed to lift the

blockade.

New leadership in PASOK A split between Prime Minister Mitsotakis and his first foreign minister, Antonis

Samaras, over Macedonia in 1992 led to the dismissal of Samaras and the collapse of

the short-lived ND government. As a response, Samaras founded his own party,

Political Spring, and in the elections of 1993 he received 5 per cent of the vote and

thereby secured 10 seats.162 PASOK, however, was to return as the victor once again,

and Papandreou returned to power. Though critical of the austerity measures

introduced by the president, Papandreou as prime minister gave his blessing to

economic policies to cut the massive Greek debt and gain control over the inflation,

all for the purpose of preparing for entrance in the European Monetary Union (EMU).

160 Radio Bubble, ‘rbnews international show 13 April 2013: The Black Book of Golden Dawn’,

[interview with Dimitris Psarras], Radio Bubble, 13.04.2013. 161 ibid., 214. 162 ibid., 213.

67

Kostis Stephanopoulos replaced Karamanlis as president in 1995 when the latter

resigned after five years. Around the same time, Papandreou also resigned due to

illness, and Kostas Simitis replaced him both as prime minister and later also as the

head of PASOK. He took it upon himself to modernise the party and attempted to

wipe out the major accusation of the party being populist. According to Simitis:

Populism transfers the social problem from the plain of ideology to a level that does not

disturb the status quo of social relations. The assistance of the state and the benefits derived

from it is the sole objective of political struggles in Greece.163

Again we are reminded of the previously mentioned patron-client relationship

frequently in use in Greek politics. These relationships could be transferred across

generations, and were also frequently used by politicians in the socialist PASOK.164

At the election of 1996, PASOK secured 162 out of 300 seats and ND 108 seats, and

there was an upsurge in the popularity of the left-wing parties, which won 15 per cent

combined and 30 seats.165

Kostas Simitis was to hold office for another two terms, throughout the election of

2000 and up until his resignation in 2004. George Papandreou, the son of Andreas,

then succeeded him as the leader of PASOK. The election of 2000 had again given

PASOK a clear majority and a comfortable 158 seats. The KKE won 5 per cent of the

vote and secured 11 seats, whereas the Coalition of the Left won 3 per cent and 6

seats. New Democracy won 125 seats.166

The decade also saw the death of two of the most prominent politicians in the post-

war era. Andreas Papandreou died after long-time illness in 1996, at the age of

163 Kostas Simitis, quoted in Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:189. 164 Koliopoulos & Veremis 2010:190. 165 Clogg 2013:225. 166 ibid., 233.

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seventy-seven, and Konstantinos Karamanlis followed close after, in 1998, at the age

of ninety-one.

The new millennium Not long after the election in 2000, a report from the US State Department ranked

Greece as one of the countries in the world with the most anti-American terrorist

attacks the preceding year. This was soon followed by the assassination of the British

military attaché by the group ‘17 November’, a remnant of the end of the military

Junta. This proved to be the last victim of the group, and ‘17 November’ was

dismantled two years later and many of its members put on trial. As the Olympic

Games were to be held in Athens in 2004, people started questioning Greece’s ability

to provide sufficient security for the event.167 Though preparation for the Olympic

Games greatly benefitted the infrastructure of the capital, with the new Eleftherios

Venizelos Airport opening in 2001, it also proved to be very costly, reaching the sum

of 9 billion euros.168

Kostas Karamanlis, the nephew of the popular Konstantinos Karamanlis, now led

New Democracy, and in the election of 2004, ND again defeated PASOK with a

majority of 45 per cent of the popular vote. PASOK gained 41 per cent.169 For the

election in 2007, there was a slight decrease in the vote for both PASOK and ND, but

ND still held the majority. The election also saw the emergence of a new party, Laikos

Orthodoxos Synagermos, or Popular Orthodox Rally (LAOS), which gained close to 4

per cent and 10 seats.170

167 ibid., 234. 168 ibid., 242. 169 ibid., 245. 170 ibid., 248; George Bistis, ‘Golden Dawn or Democratic Sunset: The Rise of the Far Right in

Greece’, in Mediterranean Quarterly, vol. 24, no. 3(2013); Vassiliki Georgiadou, ‘Right-Wing Populism and Extremism: The Rapid Rise of “Golden Dawn” in Crisis-Ridden Greece’, in Ralf Melzer & Sebastian Serafin (eds.) Right-wing Extremism in Europe. Country Analyses, Counter-Strategies and Labor-Market Oriented Exit Strategies. Friedrich Ebert Stiftung: Forum Berlin, 2013.

69

Greece joined the euro area as the twelfth member on the 1st of January 2001. In the

early 1990s, the Maastricht Treaty was discussed and with it the creation of cohesion

funds to assist those countries with a GDP lower than 90 per cent of the average for

EU countries. This was intended to help states meet the European Monetary Union’s

convergence criteria171, and mainly applied to the new member states, Greece and

Portugal.172 One of the convergence criteria included a demand that the deficit be

below 3 per cent. In November 2004, Greece admitted to having lied about its

economy in order to be accepted into the euro area, and that Greece’s deficit level had

not been around 3 per cent since 1999.173

Towards the end of the first decade in the new millennium, the fear of the far right

again became prominent. The incident with the police shooting of the 15-year-old boy

in December 2008 reminded people of the Junta, and at the election of 2009, ND lost

61 seats and fell down to 33 per cent of the vote. PASOK, on the other hand, gained

58 seats with its 44 per cent translating into a total of 160 seats. KKE won 8 per cent,

LAOS won 6 per cent, and a new party, the Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA)

won 5 per cent and 13 seats.174 SYRIZA would become a prominent part of politics

the following years. Kostas Karamanlis, the leader of ND, saw no other alternative but

to step down after this crushing defeat, and was replaced by Antonis Samaras, the old

foreign minister, who had left his own party, the right-wing Political Spring175, in

favour of ND.

The attention was soon to turn towards the global financial crisis of 2008. Greece had

been accepted into the euro area in 2001, and the Greek currency, the drachma, was

replaced by the euro in 2002. After years of debt and corruption, peaked by the

expenses of the Olympics, Greece was headed into recession. Membership in the euro

171 All member states of the EU need to meet the ‘convergence criteria’ before being allowed to enter the EMU and the euro area.

172 Cini & Borragán, 2010:295, 299. 173 BBC, ‘Greece admits fudging Euro entry’, BBC, 15.11.2004. 174 ibid., 249. 175 It is Richard Clogg that characterises the Political Spring Party as right wing, 2013:225.

70

area made a devaluation of its currency impossible, and the only solution seemed to be

internal devaluation and harsh austerity measures.

The financial crisis From September 2008 the European financial crisis was a fact. At first, measures were

taken by the Greek parliament to support the Greek banking system. Later, severe

austerity measures were introduced. As for the rest of the international community, it

took its time to respond to the crisis. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) did not

launch the first report on the situation in Greece until the 6th of August 2009. Article

IV of the report clearly stated that structural reforms and fiscal consolidations could

no longer be postponed.176 Greece was highly vulnerable due to high debt levels and

the erosion of competitiveness.

The blossoming crisis also affected the elections. In the parliamentary elections on the

4th of October 2009, PASOK won an absolute majority with 43.92 per cent of the

vote, and formed a government with George Papandreou as the new prime minister.

This also meant that Kostas Karamanlis of New Democracy was ousted after twelve

years as president of the party. On the 14th of December 2009, Prime Minister

Papandreou announced the government’s intention to reduce the fiscal deficit to 3 per

cent of gross domestic product (GDP) by 2013, from an estimated level of 12.7 per

cent in November 2009. The prime minister also announced the first round of

austerity measures and structural reforms.

In January 2010, the Greek government launched an economic stability programme.

The principal objective of this programme would be to reduce the fiscal deficit to 2.8

per cent by 2012. During the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in

January 2010, the European Union Economic and Monetary Affairs Commissioner

176 IMF, ‘IMF Executive Board Concludes 2009 Article IV Consultation with Greece’, PIN no.

09/100, 06.08.2009.

71

Joaquin Almunia did an interview with Bloomberg TV.177 In the video he spoke of the

need for a fiscal adjustment, and that this was part of a plan A to save Greece.

However, he also announced that there was no plan B. Because of the common

currency, default was not an option in the euro area.

In February 2010, the Greek government launched a harsh austerity programme, and

the EU endorsed it the very next day.178 At an extraordinary Eurozone summit on the

11th of February 2010, European leaders stated their commitment to support Greece

through the crisis. Despite the support from the leaders of the euro area, the Greek

finance minister stated in mid-February 2010 that Greece and the Greek economy

were sinking like the ‘Titanic’.179

In March the government unveiled a 4.8 billion euro austerity programme, but for all

it was worth, it did not help Greece increase its credibility in the financial markets.

Two days later the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, raised the possibility of

‘ejecting’ countries from the euro area if they did not respect the rules.180 At the end

of March 2010, the leaders of the euro area stated their intention to support Greece in

order to safeguard the stability of the euro, and also to supply Greece with emergency

funding in case Greece’s access to the financial markets was suspended.181

Not until April 2010 did Prime Minister Papandreou see the need to make an official

request for financial support.182 His request was answered on the 2nd of May when the

leaders of the euro area and the IMF agreed to provide an emergency loan of 110

177 Joaquin Almunia, ‘EU’s Almunia Says “No Plan B” to Plug Greek Deficit’, [Interview], Bloomberg, 29.01.2010.

178 European Comission, ‘Commission assesses Stability Programme of Greece’, IP/10/116. 03.02.2010.

179 Julia Kollewe, ‘Greece defends “Titanic” efforts to tackle financial crisis’, The Guardian, 15.02.2010.

180 Jack Ewing, ‘Merkel Urges Tougher Rules for Euro Zone’, The New York Times, 17.03.2010. 181 Richard Wray, ‘Angela Merkel: EU summit should not discuss bailout for Greece’, The

Guardian, 21.03.2010. 182 Andrew Walker, ‘Greece calls on EU-IMF rescue loans’, BBC, 23.04.2010; Niki Kitsantonis &

Matthew Saltmarsh, ‘Greece, Out of Ideas, Request Global Aid’, The New York Times, 23.04.2010.

72

billion euros to Greece, on the condition that Greece would have to implement an

austerity programme of 30 billion euros.183 The parliament agreed to the conditions of

the first bailout with 172 out of 300 votes, but the result was met with violent

demonstrations in Athens and ended in the loss of three lives.184

Protests were again reported outside the Greek parliament in May 2011. There were

also reported rumours at the time that members of the euro area were contemplating a

possible Greek exit. In a cabinet reshuffle in June, Evangelos Venizelos was made the

new finance minister.185 This was done just in time for the vote for the new austerity

package measures that took place at the end of the month. Amidst violent

demonstrations, which led to clashes between the police and protestors in front of the

Greek parliament, the proposal still passed with 155 votes in favour and 136

against.186 This was a somewhat surprising result, since the polls at the time suggested

that between 70 and 80 per cent of the people were opposed to the austerity plan. In an

interview done with BBC reporter Malcolm Brabant, a bank worker reportedly said:

‘We know very well that these measures will be our tombstone […] They will have

extreme consequences for workers and for everyone on all social levels.’187

Unemployment levels continued to increase as yet another austerity bill passed

through parliament in October. The bill also included a plan for a cutback of 30,000

workers in the public sector.188 At least 70,000 people now joined the protests in front

183 IMF, ‘Europe and IMF Agree €110 Billion Financing Plan With Greece’, 02.05.2010; Lefteris

Papadimas & Jan Strupczewski, ‘EU, IMF agree $147 billion bailout for Greece’, Reuters, 02.05.2010; Gavin Hewitt, ‘Eurozone approves massive Greece bail-out’, BBC, 02.05.2010.

184 Clogg 2013:253; Malcolm Brabant, ‘Three dead as Greece protest turns violent’, BBC, 05.05.2010.

185 The Telegraph, ‘Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou announces cabinet reshuffle’, The Telegraph, 17.06.2011; Helena Smith, ‘Greece's new finance minister faces unenviable task’, The Guardian, 17.06.2011.

186 Graeme Wearden, ‘Greek parliament passes bill enabling new package of austerity measures’, The Guardian, 30.06.2011; Maria Petrakis & Natalie Weeks, ‘Papandreou Wins Budget Vote as Risk of Default Recedes’, Bloomberg, 29.06.2011.

187 Malcolm Brabant, ‘Greece protest against austerity package turns violent’, BBC, 28.06.2011. 188 Kerin Hope, ‘Greece approves austerity bill on first reading’, The Financial Times, 19.10.2011.

73

of the parliament in Syntagma Square in Athens. 189 The anti-austerity protests

continued through-out the month, and by the end, Prime Minister George Papandreou

decided to call for a confidence vote and a referendum to approve a deal made by the

euro summit for a new 130 billion euro loan to Greece.190 The news caused great

turmoil, both nationally as well as internationally. Papandreou won the vote with 153

votes in favour and 145 votes against, but was soon after summoned to the G20

summit in Cannes, after which he revoked the referendum and resigned on the 6th of

November.191 A few days later, Lukas Papademos, a non-partisan leader of a tripartite

coalition government consisting of PASOK, ND and LAOS replaced him as prime

minister.192

On the 12th of February 2012, the Greek parliament approved the new loan agreement

with a two-thirds majority. Again, the vote was met with major demonstrations and

due to the use of Molotov cocktails, more than 40 buildings were set on fire in the

Greek capital.193 The new austerity measures also led to LAOS leaving the coalition,

leaving PASOK and ND in a bipartite government.194 In a public speech, president of

the European Commission José Manuel Barroso spoke of the Eurogroup’s approval of

the new agreement for a second financial assistance programme for Greece. Barroso

finished by emphasising that ‘We [the Eurogroup] are committed to the future of the

Euro.’195

189 Renee Maltezou & Harry Papachristou, ‘Greece adopts austerity bill amid protests’, Reuters,

20.10.2011. 190 Euro Summit Statement, 26.10.2011. 191 Graeme Wearden, ‘Greek PM Papandreou wins confidence vote – November 4 2011’, The

Guardian, 04.11.2011; Smith, ‘Eurozone crisis: Greek PM George Papandreou to resign’. 192 Mark Lowen, ‘Lucas Papademos named as new Greek prime minister’, BBC, 10.11.2011. 193 Rachel Donadio & Niki Kitsantonis, ‘Greek Parliament Passes Austerity Plan After Riots

Rage’, The New York Times, 06.05.2012; BBC, ‘Buildings ablaze as Greek MPs vote on austerity plan’, BBC, 12.02.2012.

194 Donadio & Kitsantonis, ‘Greek Parliament Passes Austerity Plan After Riots Rage’. 195 José Manuel Barroso, ‘Statement by José Manuel Barroso on Greece, 21/02/2012, Brussels’,

21.02.2012.

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The far right from 1974 to 2012 As the financial crisis took its toll on the Greek economy, the far right used the crisis

as a springboard towards further acknowledgement in the general population. The

increase in number of immigrants in a struggling community was perhaps easy to

identify and present as the scapegoats, along with the leading politicians. According to

Vassiliki Georgiadou it was ‘characteristic of the Greek parliamentary democracy in

this period that there was no room in the political arena for far-right politics’.196

Instead the conservative ND absorbed the votes of many who considered themselves

ultranationalist and pro-monarchists, as well as the old supporters of the Junta. An

example is the absorption of National Alignment (Greek: Εθνική Παράταξις) in the

early 1980s.

New Democracy has also experienced the dominating cleavages in Greek politics.

When the monarchy was finally abolished in 1974, an ultraconservative faction

withdrew its support for New Democracy. As the only anti-communist, pro-

monarchist party with some significant electoral basis in the parliament next to ND

after the end of the Junta, National Alignment was determined to punish ND for its

neutrality on the fate of the monarchy in the elections of 1977.197 Towards the end of

the 1970s, ND lost over half a million voters, mainly to the socialist PASOK, but also

to National Alignment, which was slightly further to the right of ND. National

Alignment was absorbed into ND when ND leaders, Konstantinos Karamanlis and

Georgios Rallis, decided to use the following simple tactics: ‘In the 1981

parliamentary elections they placed the number two from National Alignment third on

their national electoral list and put MPs and activists of National Alignment on the

party list.’198

196 Georgiadou 2013:76. 197 ibid., 78. 198 ibid., 80.

75

Other far right parties after the end of the Junta include the short-lived Progressive

Party (KP) and the more successful National Political Union (EPEN). EPEN emerged

after the disintegration of National Alignment, and during the 1980s it was able to

mobilise some influence among extreme right-wingers. EPEN was nostalgic about the

military regime of the Junta and demanded the release of the imprisoned colonels;

former dictator Georgios Papadopoulos was in fact considered the ‘spiritual leader’ of

the party.199 As we shall see, EPEN was also to be the starting point of Nikos

Michaloliakos’ political career.

It took years before another right-wing party appeared on the political arena. People’s

Orthodox Rally, shortened LAOS, the Greek word for ‘people’, entered the stage in

the late 2000s, and won 3,8 per cent of the votes at the elections of 2007, and in so

doing overcame the 3 per cent threshold and gained 10 members of parliament.200

This was the first time that the far right had any significant presence in parliament

since the beginning of the Metapolitefsi.

A somewhat surprising turn of events was seen in November 2011 when PASOK and

ND decided to create an interim coalition government under the leadership of Lukas

Papademos. Despite having held a majority for years, the support for both parties had

fallen, and there was a need to include another party to regain the majority. The

question was whether Papademos should turn to the left or the right for support. He

decided to invite LAOS, rather than SYRIZA or KKE due to the two latter parties’

strong opposition to his economic policies.201

The general support for LAOS was, however, soon to decrease, at the same time that

support for Golden Dawn increased (see table 1 below). Of course, it takes larger

political surveys to prove that previous supporters of LAOS voted for Golden Dawn in

the elections of 2012, and saying so is mere speculation on my part. LAOS still gained

199 ibid., 81. 200 ibid., 83; Bistis 2013. 201 Bistis 2013.

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two members of parliament in the European Parliament in 2009, as the only far right

party in Greece.

Intra-governmental crises and anti-racist measures:

Recent developments 2012–2014

Parliamentary elections 2012

The year of 2012 again saw two parliamentary elections, one closely followed by the

other. The elections would come to see the establishment of a political stage defined

by multi-party rather than two-party politics. After the fall of the Junta in 1974, the

political system in Greece has mostly been a two-party system dominated by PASOK

and New Democracy. The communists have always played a part on the political

scene, albeit a minor one after the civil war. Even so, in the elections of 2012 one

should note the sudden rise in support for the radical left, here represented by

SYRIZA. Though originally functioning as a coalition between left wing and radical

left parties, as well as ecological parties, SYRIZA was founded before the elections in

2004, in which the newly established party came in fourth with 3.26 per cent of the

votes and 6 seats in parliament.202 Despite being in the minority in parliament,

SYRIZA quickly gained support in the broader population. In the elections of 2007,

their share of the votes had increased slightly to 5 per cent and a total of 14 seats.203

They kept 13 of the seats after the elections of 2009, and also gained a seat in the

European Parliament the same year.204 However, 4 of their MPs would come to leave

the party in June 2010 to form the Democratic Left (DIMAR), which would come to

be among the biggest parties in the following elections.205

202 Ministry of Internal Affairs, ekloges.ypes.gr [17.02.2014]. 203 ibid. 204 ibid. 205 E Kathimerini, ‘Syriza split creates new party’, E Kathimerini, 10.06.2010.

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SYRIZA was popular in front of the parliamentary elections in May 2012, and the

results showed, what some characterised as a surprising turn of events as the party

gained 16.78 per cent of the votes, pushing PASOK down to third with 13.18 per

cent.206 SYRIZA’s results were to be further improved in the re-elections in June, with

26.9 per cent giving them 71 seats in parliament.207

As mentioned, PASOK’s results are surprising if one looks at the long-ruling two-

party politics that had been dominant in Greek politics since the 1970s. The New York

Times interpreted the results of the election as ‘a rejection of the terms of the bailout

[…] The elections were seen as pivotal, determining both the country’s future in

Europe and its prospects for economic recovery.’ 208 The voters seemed to be

punishing the leading parties, PASOK and ND, and instead showed their support for

the parties that were opposed to both the existing government as well as the terms of

the loan agreement offered to Greece. This included 8.48 per cent to the old KKE,

6.11 per cent to the newly established DIMAR, but also a significant 10.60 per cent to

the eurosceptic conservative party Independent Greeks (ANEL) and 6.97 per cent to

Golden Dawn (see table 1 below).209

New Democracy still won the elections, but with an all time low of only 18.85 per

cent of the votes. Efforts to form a coalition government were unsuccessful, and new

elections were called for approximately six weeks later, the 17th of June. This time,

ND had strengthened their position and won 29.66 per cent of the vote. SYRIZA was

not far behind with 26.9 per cent, but PASOK had sunk even further and only received

12.3 per cent of the votes.210 The result was a tripartite coalition government by

PASOK, ND and DIMAR, with ND’s Antonis Samaras as the new prime minister.

206 Ministry of Internal Affairs. 207 ibid. 208 Rachel Donadio & Niki Kitsantonis, ‘Greek Voters Punish 2 Main Parties for Collapse’, The

New York Times, 06.05.2012. 209 Ministry of Internal Affairs. 210 ibid.

78

The result of the 2012 elections was a many-faceted government with parties ranging

from the far left to the far right, including ‘neo-Nazis, Stalinists and Maoists together

with radical, radical leftwingers, populist rightwingers and a numerous defenders of

paranoid conspiracy theories’211– all parties with authoritarian features. Once again,

the situation is not unlike the developments in Germany under the Weimar Republic,

leading up to the dictatorship of Adolf Hitler.

Table 1: Greek Election results 2000–2012: Percentage of votes and number of MPs.

2012:  17.6   2012:  6.5   2009   2007   2004   2000  

             New  Democracy  

29.66  %   18.85  %   33.47  %   41.84  %   45.36  %   42.70  %  

    129   108   91   152   166   125  

               PASOK  

12.28  %   13.18  %   43.92  %   38.10  %   40.55  %   43.80  %  

    33   41   160   102   116   158  

               SYRIZA  

26.89  %   16.79  %   4.60  %   5.04  %   3.26  %      

    71   52   13   14   6      

               KKE  

4.50  %   8.48  %   7.54  %   8.15  %   5.90  %   5.53  %  

    12   26   21   22   12   11  

DIMAR  

6.25  %   6.11  %                  

    17   19                  

               XA  

6.92  %   6.97  %   0.29  %  

              18   21   0  

ANEL  

7.51  %   10.60  %                  

    20   33                  

 LAOS  

        5.63  %   3.8  %   2.19  %      

        15   10   0      

    Others   5.34  %   18.90  %   4.54  %   2.56  %   2.74  %   4.80  %  

Source: Ministry of Internal Affairs, ekloges.ypes.gr.

211 Aristides Hatzis, ‘Watch Greece – it may be the next Weimar Germany’, The Financial Times, 06.11.2013.

79

‘Has Greece’s economy finally turned a corner?’212

The new government under the leadership of Samaras met one of its largest challenges

in November when the Greek parliament approved the Medium-Term Fiscal Strategy

(MTFS) for 2013–2016, by a three-vote majority.213 The New York Times had noted as

early as April 2010 that the financial crisis had ‘highlighted the constraints of euro

membership’.214 Because of a common fiscal policy for the whole euro area, single

countries are unable to devaluate in times of need to help regain competitiveness in

the international market. The agreement between the euro area and the EU also

dictated the requirement to meet certain budget targets, the result of which was hard

austerity measures at a time when the economy would rather have benefitted from

additional spending. The MTFS was a part of a larger National Restructuring Plan to

reduce deficits and regain the credibility of the Greek economy.215 The strategy also

included another austerity package of 13.5 billion euros. DIMAR abstained from the

vote and members of parliament from both New Democracy and PASOK rejected the

strategy. Later the same month, the Eurogroup decided to resume the disbursements to

Greece, and the Greek programme was extended for another two years.216 On the 21st

of January 2013, the Eurogroup ‘note[d] with satisfaction’ that Greece fulfilled its

commitments.217 Greece returned to the financial market in early April 2014, for a

first sale of government bonds since the crisis started.218

The anti-racist bill and the shut down of the Public Broadcasting Service

Between the 21st of May and the 6th of June 2013, Greece experienced an intra-

governmental crisis because of a disagreement amongst the parties of the governing

212 Mark Lowen, ‘Has Greece’s economy finally turned a corner?’, BBC, 11.12.2013. 213 Medium-Term Fiscal Strategy 2013-2016. Hellenic Republic Ministry of Finance. June 2011. 214 Niki Kitsantonis & Matthew Saltmarsh, ‘Greece, Out of Ideas, Request Global Aid’, The New

York Times, 23.04.2010. 215 Medium-Term Fiscal Strategy 2013-2016. 216 Eurogroup, ‘Eurogroup statement on Greece’, 27.11.2012. 217 Eurogroup, ‘Summary Eurogroup (21 January 2013)’, 21.01.2013. 218 Graeme Wearden & Helena Smith, ‘Greek return to financial markets attrackts flock of

investors’, The Guardian, 09.04.2014.

80

coalition on the content of an anti-racist bill. The increase in racist violence had led

the more centre-left parties in government, DIMAR and PASOK, to wish for such a

bill to supplement the existing legislative framework. The aim of the bill would be to

impose tougher penalties for racist attacks, and could be seen as one of the first

serious attempts by the government to counter the growing influence of Golden Dawn.

This was later confirmed by PASOK leader Venizelos, who said, ‘Greece has a

political grouping that is unashamedly Nazi and organizes acts violating the rule of

law.’219

Yet another crisis in the Greek government followed the government’s closing of the

Public Broadcasting Company. The decision led to strong reactions both from the

opposition and the trade unions. The crisis led to the withdrawal of DIMAR from

government, upon which a new two-party government with New Democracy and

PASOK was announced on the 24th of June.220

The murder of Pavlos Fyssas and the arrest of Michaloliakos

In September 2013, newspapers all over the world reported the murder of the anti-

fascist rapper Pavlos ‘Killah P’ Fyssas by Giorgos Roupakias, a member of XA.

Reactions took place throughout Europe, with anti-fascist demonstrations in cities like

Barcelona, Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam and London.221 Prime Minister Samaras was

quick to condemn the killing and said that he would not let Golden Dawn ‘undermine’

democracy: ‘This government is determined not to let the descendants of the Nazis

poison out social life or commit crimes’, Samaras reportedly said in a national TV

address.222 Though the leadership of XA denied any connection with Roupakias or the

murder of Fyssas, speculations on the involvement of the party began and were soon

219 Niki Kitsantonis, ‘Push for Antiracism Bill Leads to Rift in Greek Coalition’, The New York Times, 28.05.2013.

220 E Kathimerini, ‘Greece coalition partner pulls out ministers in wake of ERT debacle’, E Kathimerini, 21.06.2013.

221 Margarita Papantoniou, ‘Anti-fascist Demonstrations Around Europe for Fyssas’, Greek Reporter, 19.09.2013; BBC, ‘”Neo-Nazi” held over Greek musician Pavlos Fyssas death’, BBC, 18.09.2013.

222 BBC, ‘Greece PM Antonis Samaras condemns “neo-Nazi” killing’, BBC, 19.09.2013.

81

followed by the arrest of prominent Golden Dawn members. XA’s leader,

Michaloliakos, was also arrested and formally charged for leading a criminal

organisation.223 The anti-terrorism unit arrested a total of 20 people, including four of

XA’s members of parliament.

As of April 2014, Michaloliakos is still in prison, awaiting trial. Golden Dawn are also

facing a new crisis as one of the members of parliament, Chrysovalantis Alexopoulos,

chose to leave the party and instead decided to sit in parliament as an independent.

This was directly before the parliament was to vote on the possibility of pressing

criminal charges against XA’s 18 members of parliament, charged for using their

position to organise a criminal organisation. Alexopoulos himself claimed that he had

no prior knowledge of the criminal activities of the party, and that he now withdrew

because he no longer wished to be associated with XA’s actions and practices.224

Alexopoulos’ actions will likely affect the trial against the members of Golden Dawn,

including Michaloliakos, as it can be seen as an implicit admission that the acts of XA

should indeed be seen as criminal. Alexopoulos’ proclaimed innocence could also be

questioned if one takes into account the recruitment process of XA. Membership in

XA can be characterised as semi-exclusive. According to XA’s statutes, ‘[a]ny Greek

citizen or Greek in Genus’ can become a party member after a recommendation by

two existing members of the party.225 The relevant committee must then approve the

potential member. All new members who gain prominent positions in XA must also

go through a trial period of one year of active involvement prior to getting the right to

vote or stand for intraparty elections. 226 It therefore seems rather unlikely that

Alexopoulos was unaware of XA’s policies and actions.

223 Mark Lowen, ‘Greece crackdown: Golden Dawn leader Michaloliakos charged’, BBC,

29.09.2013; Smith, ‘Golden Dawn leader Nikolaos Michaloliakos arrested’. 224 Helena Smith, ‘Crisis for Golden Dawn as MP leaves, claiming ignorance of criminal

activities’, The Guardian, 17.03.2014. 225 Ellinas 2012:11. 226 ibid.

82

6 People’s Association – Golden Dawn Golden Dawn began as a national socialist magazine in 1980. Many of those who took

part in the establishment of the magazine were previous members of the 4th of August

Party that had been disbanded in 1977, including the founder of XA, Nikos

Michaloliakos, who had joined the party at 16. The magazine was soon to be

described as neo-Nazi and often featured articles hailing Adolf Hitler. In the late

1970s, Michaloliakos spent time in prison. There he befriended the former Junta

dictator Georgios Papadopoulos and was asked to lead the youth organisation of the

far right party EPEN. He left the organisation a few years later in order to establish

Golden Dawn as a political party. However, Golden Dawn did not participate in

national elections until 1996, in which they won 4,487 votes or 0.07 per cent of the

total votes.227 After their defeat, XA temporarily retreated from politics until their

comeback in the local elections in Athens in 2010. Here they won 5.29 per cent of the

vote and Michaloliakos gained a seat in the city council.228

To understand the ideology of Golden Dawn one needs to take into account not only

official party documents, but also the writings and activities of the party leaders. To

try to define what the party is working towards may be just as interesting as finding

out what they are against. The analysis is therefore structured into three parts. The

first part will answer the following question: What do they want? This may sound

simple enough. XA wishes to create a popular state229, but what exactly does this

227 Ministry of Internal Affairs. 228 Ellinas 2012. 229 A note on the translation: XA Ameriki has translated ‘Λαϊκό κράτος’ (Laïkó krátos) to ‘social

state’. I have still chosen to use ‘popular state’ in my analysis, as I believe it is more accurate and closer to the original text. Even so, the translation by XA Ameriki to ‘social’ is understandable, considering that Golden Dawn frequently refers to its movement as national socialist. The frequent use of both ‘third’ (Third Great Ideology) and ‘social’ may also be a reference to Italian neo-fascism, with the Movimento Sociale Italiano and Terza Posizione (Third Position), which has arguably inspired other nationalists such as the British National Party’s Nick Griffin, a known supporter of XA. Metaxas also spoke of creating the Third Hellenic Civilisation. The translation of ‘Λαϊκό’ to ‘popular’ has been approved both by Nina Biering Alexidis and Dr Vemund Aarbakke, professor at the University of Thessaloniki.

83

entail? Who constitutes the people that will be allowed to reside within this state and

who will be excluded? The second part will look at the organisation, including the

structure of the movement and use of symbols. The third part will look at the electoral

base of XA and also discuss what motives may have governed people’s decision to

vote for the party.

Ideology The ideology of Golden Dawn is mainly presented in The Program of the Golden

Dawn and Our Identity, The Manifesto of Golden Dawn. 230 From now on, these two

documents are only referred to as the Programme and the Manifesto.

The third great ideology and the popular state

In Chapter 2 I mentioned that typical forms of nationalism seek to preserve and

highlight common features within a populace, aiming to create some form of unity.

According to the Manifesto, ‘nationalism is the only absolute and true revolution

because it seeks the birth of new moral, spiritual and mental values.’ Nationalism is

also frequently referred to as the ‘Third Great Ideology’. This ideology does not want

‘to salvage anything from the current economic and social interests that lead nations,

peoples and cultures in decline.’ Golden Dawn is also open about its critique of the

existing political system, and especially the left and right spectrum of party politics.

These two opposing poles are an illusion created to uphold the dominance of

‘cosmopolitan internationalists, anti-national and anti-social forces.’ The only solution

to this is to abandon the system altogether, and instead create a popular state ‘where

political power comes from the people, without party promoters.’231 The Metapolitefsi

era, i.e., the time after the fall of the Junta is seen as a ‘national tragedy’. It is the ‘the

final act of a drama that led our Nation to financial destruction, dissolved the social

230 The Manifesto can also be found in English in the Appendix. 231 Ellinas 2012; XA Ameriki, ‘The Manifesto of Golden Dawn’; Golden Dawn, ‘Kinima’

[Ideology].

84

and national fabric of our country, crushed the Hellenic ethos and every traditional

value.’232

Though the Manifesto is against party promoters, the Programme leaves no doubt

about the fact that there is still one party that should be allowed. However, the XA

shall, once having gained power through democratic means, rely heavily on

referendums. In fact, the people should be truly sovereign and referendums should

therefore be held ‘for every important national issue’.233 According to XA, the people

have never before been able to express its opinion in major political decisions.

Ministers should be appointed on the grounds of knowledge and experience, and will

not receive any special treatment. Their privileges will be abolished, and their

payment reduced. It may seem ironic that in the Programme, XA also want to abolish

the immunity of ministers, the very immunity that the sitting parliament at this very

moment is trying to remove in order to formally charge XA’s members of parliament

for participating in illegal activities.

The goal is ‘to revive Hellenism and help Hellas become a central power of the

geopolitically sensitive area of the Eastern Mediterranean.’234 To achieve this goal one

must first reach national independence. The Programme emphasises the strategic,

geopolitical value of Greece, including Cyprus, and maintains that it is possible to

solve the modern financial problems and give Greece a prominent position on the

international market if her resources are properly exploited. For energy and resources,

Greece should turn away from the West and instead concentrate on Russia and the

Middle East. The Greek debt should be deleted, and all connections to the EMU and

the EU should be broken. For XA, the power lies in the hands of the ‘Hellenes’ and

the popularly termed Grexit is seen as a huge weapon as ‘[t]he cost of Greece’s exit

from the EU will be disastrous for the world economy.’235 A Grexit would create a

232 Golden Dawn International Newsroom, ‘The Program of the Golden Dawn’. 233 ibid. 234 ibid. 235 ibid.

85

domino effect, ‘Portugal, Spain and Italy would be next […] and the whole planet will

be facing an economic depression.’236

In 2012, Eurostat could report that 31 per cent of the population, 3.5 million people,

were living near or below the poverty line.237 As for unemployment, levels reached an

all time high in November 2013 with 28 per cent of the total population, an increase

from 7.7 per cent in 2008. The unemployment rate for young people between the ages

of 15 and 24 went up from 28.9 per cent to 63.2 per cent for females and from 17 per

cent to 48.4 per cent for men between 2008 and 2012.238 The suicide rates also went

up. A newly released study shows that austerity was the cause of over 500 cases of

suicide in men between 2009 and 2010.239

In the words of XA, ‘[e]very foreign worker equals a Greek unemployed.’240 The

party therefore wishes to fight unemployment by deporting all illegal immigrants.

They also wish to strengthen the national economy through an increase in primary

production. Work will be hard, and they do not promise richness and glory, only the

sufficient means to get by. XA therefore wants to recoup the loan the Bank of Greece

gave to the German Army during the occupation in the Second World War.241

A Golden Dawner

Twelve points that characterise what it means to be a Golden Dawner build up The

Manifesto of Golden Dawn and each point is written as a personal testimony.

236 ibid. 237 Daniel Trilling, ‘A warning from Athens: in Greece, the far right has taken advantage of public

anxiety caused by hyper-austerity, stoking xenophobia and violence. But the country’s experience is by no means unique’, New Statesman, 12.12.2012.

238 Data from the World Bank, data.worldbank.org/indicator/SL.UEM.TOTL.ZS/countries/GR--XS?display=graph [13.03.2014]; BBC, ‘Greece jobless rate hits new record of 28%’, BBC, 13.02.2014; E Kathimerini, ‘Greek unemployment rises to 27.5 percent in Q4 of 2013; young women worst off’, E Kathimerini, 13.03.2014.

239 Katie Allen, ‘Austerity in Greece caused more than 500 male suicides, say researchers’, The Guardian, 21.04.2014.

240 Golden Dawn International Newsroom, ‘The Program of the Golden Dawn’. 241 ibid.

86

[As a Golden Dawner] I embrace the need for a […] state that constantly serves the eternal

revolutionary principles of the Nationalist Worldview, with the ultimate goal of forming a

new society and a new type of man.242

This is the second point of the Manifesto. It not only speaks of a revolution to replace

the existing society, but for a revolution that goes even deeper, where the ultimate

goal is to create ενός νέου τύπου ανθρώπου, a new type of man, or a new race

altogether. This society should be governed by the popular state and the power should

reside with the people. This point is similar to Griffin’s palingenetic ultra-nationalism

that speaks of a revolution in which a new man will be created. This new type of man

is born out of the decadence and experience that have led to the decay of modern

society. A Golden Dawner is an enemy of the existing system, or in their own words,

of ‘every power that spreads this disease that finds foothold in the Plutocracy’.243 For

XA these powers represent the reason for Greece’s decay, not only in recent years, but

all the way back to the Second World War.

The revolution is sometimes referred to as the end of the Metapolitefsi. This could be

interpreted as a critique solely of the developments after, and not of the developments

prior to, the regime of the Junta. That XA Ameriki and other Golden Dawn members

frequently refer to the 4th of August regime of Metaxas, and have also gone so far as

to compare XA leader Michaloliakos to the military dictator, supports this

interpretation.244 So too does the party’s use of the Celtic cross as one of their

symbols, as Metaxas also did (see figure 3 below). It may then seem ironic that the

third point in the Manifesto states that they do not support previous right-wing

regimes, they mention, for instance, that they neither support a military-financial

dictatorship, nor a parliamentary dictatorship, i.e., the Junta and the two-party system

of ND and PASOK, as ‘those are two sides of the same coin, and their purpose is to

242 XA Ameriki, ‘The Manifesto of Golden Dawn’. 243 ibid. 244 See XA Ameriki, ‘Frequently asked questions’, xaameriki.wordpress.com/faq/ [22.03.2014].

87

tear down national identity.’ Put another way, XA wants a revolution, even though

they advocate a type of nationalism that also glorifies the past.

International aspirations

Golden Dawn not only works for the ‘indigenous Greeks’ within the Greek borders,

but has also long sought cooperation with similar organisations abroad, and exhibited

a will to expand beyond its own borders. According to XA’s view that all who are

born Greek are Greek nationals, the party also wishes to include Greeks living abroad.

In an article about XA’s wish to expand ‘wherever there are Greeks’, Dimitris Psarras

says that Golden Dawn ‘not only wants to become the central pole of a pan-European

alliance of neo-Nazis,’ but that ‘[i]t wants to spread its influence worldwide.’245 Local

branches of Golden Dawn have been established in other parts of the world as well,

with XA Ameriki being the most prominent one.

Michaloliakos has also been open about his support for a revival of the Megali Idea

and has expressed wishes to take back Turkey and Izmir as well as the Black Sea.246

Xenophobia and anti-immigration

‘The nation is one race. That’s how God fixed [the] Earth’, Golden Dawn Member of

Parliament Ilias Panagiotaros said in an interview done by the Australian news

channel 60 Minutes.247 For him, the number of illegal immigrants in the past years is

seen as an invasion. It is an undeclared war that someone needs to fight. Being the

gateway to Europe from both the Asian and the African continent, Greece has

experienced an increase in immigration over the past years.248 The numbers increased

245 Dimitris Psarras, quoted in Helena Smith, ‘Greece’s neo-Nazi Golden Dawn goes global with

political ambitions’, The Guardian, 01.04.2013. 246 Today’s Zaman, ‘Greek far-right leader vows to “take back” Istanbul, Izmir’, Today’s Zaman,

15.06.2012. 247 Allison Langdon, ‘Greek Tragedy: The rise of Europe’s neo-Nazis’, 60 Minutes, 10.04.2014;

Helena Smith, ‘Greece’s Golden Dawn party describes Hitler as “great personality”’, The Guardian, 16.04.2014.

248 International Organization for Migration (IOM), www.iom.int/cms/en/sites/iom/home/where-we-work/europa/european-economic-area/greece.html [24.03.2014].

88

even further due to EU regulations that allow member states to send immigrants back

to the European country in which they first set foot, which is often Greece. Members

of XA are often accused of violent acts towards immigrants and ethnic minorities. In

March 2013, the British TV broadcaster Channel 4 published a video made by the

student Konstantinos Georgousis, who had spent a month filming members of Golden

Dawn on the streets of Athens. The video shows how members of XA operate on the

streets of the Greek capital, campaigning for their party and proudly expressing their

extreme ideas and proclaiming their hatred for immigrants.249 This is also stated in

The Manifesto of Golden Dawn. The second paragraph is worth quoting in its entirety:

The social [popular] nationalist movement of GOLDEN DAWN [sic] finds itself at the

frontline of the struggle against nation-killing memorandum and the sinful regime of the

parties that consists the political establishment. We fight against altering our racial

demographics by the millions of illegal immigrants, and the dissolution of the Greek society

promoted by both the coalition parties and the so-called left. We propose a national strategy

so that we can overcome the crisis imposed on our country. We are struggling for a Greece

that belongs to the Greeks.250

The last sentence warrants particular attention. It suggests that the Greek identity is

exclusive rather than inclusive. The question, then, is to whom does the title of

‘Greek’ apply? As the previous chapters on Greek history have shown, the Greek

identity was not originally based on ethnic criteria, but was instead determined by

linguistic as well as territorial grounds. Today Greek nationality can be acquired either

through descent, following the principle of jus sanguinis, or through naturalisation.

Obtaining nationality through naturalisation is possible for aliens over the age of 18 if

one follows the following three prerequisites:

a) One makes a declaration before the mayor or chairman of the village where one resides;

b) One has lived within Greece the last ten out of twelve years or if one intend to reside in

Greece five years after the declaration concerning naturalisation;

249 Channel 4, ‘Filming with the neo-Nazis of Golden Dawn’, Channel 4, 05.03.2013. 250 XA Ameriki, ‘The Manifesto of Golden Dawn’.

89

c) One has submitted an application for naturalisation to the Ministry of the Interior251

It is then up to the minister of the interior to decide whether or not the alien should be

naturalised after an investigation of the character and personality of the alien.

However, when asked to define whom XA considers as Greek, XA Ameriki states that

the party line of XA is that you are born Greek, you do not become Greek. In other

words, XA emphasises the use of nationality defined through blood rather than by

naturalisation. The question of immigration, and especially of illegal immigration, is

referred to as the ‘Elephant in the Room’.252 According to XA Ameriki, about 1/3 of

the Greek population live ‘condensed’ in the metropolitan areas of Athens, and the

areas are getting increasingly more crowded because ‘roughly around 4/5ths of

Greece’s 3 million illegal immigrants have also settled there’ in the past 15 years.253

XA opposes the increase of immigrants in the past two decades and claims that

Greece had little experience with violence and rape, before the large inflow of

immigrants.

When the indigenous Greek population cried for help, the state ignored them, as most wealthy

state officials lived in areas where all illegal immigrants did was take care of their large

gardens and houses as servants.254

The sentence is highlighted in bold and the ‘Elephant in the Room’ is illustrated by a

video of Shi’ite Muslims in Greece celebrating the religious festival of Ashura with

prayer, song and self-flagellation.255

Some have claimed that the success of Golden Dawn in the 2012 elections was also

due to their pledge ‘to “scour the country” clean of illegal immigrants.’ 256

251 Code of Greek Nationality, Chapter A, Article 6, available in English at www.legislationline.org/topics/country/27/topic/2 [21.03.2014]

252 XA Ameriki, ‘Frequently Asked Questions’. 253 ibid. 254 ibid. 255 The video was also published by Reuters, ‘Greek Shi’ites mark Ashura with fierce

flaggelation’, Reuters, 25.11.2012.

90

Nevertheless, it should be said that it is not only the parties on the far right that have

expressed discontentment with immigration. In front of the second election of 2012,

ND’s Samaras reportedly called for a crackdown on immigrants, promising that the

‘mass invasion of immigrants’ would stop and the ‘mass return to their homelands’

would begin.257 In that sense, the leader of ND only affirms what seems to have

become a strong tendency towards xenophobia, especially on the streets of Athens.

The violence against immigrants predates the crisis, but it was not highlighted until

two Afghans killed a Greek man on his way to fetch the car to take his pregnant wife

to the hospital. For Golden Dawn, this was probably an opportunity they could not

ignore, and they arranged for a pogrom that lasted for two weeks, in which fascist

gangs frequently attacked non-whites in broad daylight. They also destroyed

immigrant shops.258 XA has also proposed placing landmines on the borders of Greece

to permanently prevent a continued inflow of illegal immigrants.259

A study done by the Racist Violence Recording Network reported 87 attacks in

Greece between January and September 2012. 83 of these attacks took place in public

spaces for all to see.260 The report also emphasised incidents in which there was a

connection between the police and racist violence. As an example, it is interesting to

note that Greek mainstream media stopped reporting ‘Neo-Nazi attacks on migrant

communities’ at the end of 2012.261 Approximately half a year later, in June 2013,

Human Rights Watch launched the report Unwelcome Guests, detailing the actions of

the Greek police towards what they assumed to be illegal immigrants. The police

operation started in August 2012 and was named ‘Operation Xenios Zeus’, named

256 John Hadoulis, ‘Michaloliakos: Golden Dawn leader in sights of Greek justice’, E Kathimerini,

03.10.2013. 257 E Kathimerini, ‘Samaras calls on electorate to shun SYRIZA’, E Kathimerini, 15.06.2012. 258 Trilling ‘A warning from Athens …’. 259 Bistis 2013. 260 Racist Violence Recording Network, ‘2012 Annual report of the racist violence recording

network’. 261 Dimitris Dalakoglou, ‘Neo-Nazism and Neoliberalism: A few comments on violence in Athens

at the time of crisis’, in Working USA: The Journal of Labor and Society, vol. 16, 2013:283.

91

after the Greek god of hospitality.262 The HRW report had gone through official

statistics and found that between the 4th of August 2012 and the 22nd of February

2013, almost 85,000 people of foreign origin had been stopped on the streets of

Athens and led to the police station for further examination of identification papers

and legal status. Out of these 85,000 people, only 6 per cent proved to be residing

unlawfully in Greece. The reports document that xenophobic violence and anti-

immigration have proved not to be a phenomenon isolated to far right groupings such

as Golden Dawn.

Organisation

Structure

Little has previously been officially known about the structure of Golden Dawn.

Recently, E Kathimerini wrote that documents unveiling more information about the

organisational structure of XA had been found at the apartments of many of the

arrested members of parliament. After the arrest of yet another of Golden Dawn’s

members of parliament, Christos Pappas, in April 2014, new discoveries showed

documents describing the structure of XA being similar to a medieval German

military order with a rigid hierarchy. 263 Amongst the documents was also an

organisational chart in the form of a pyramid of power with the leader at the top.264

The organisation is more similar to a paramilitary movement than a political party,

and it includes a youth organisation and stormtroopers dressed in black, usually with

‘Chrysi Avgi’ in capital white letters on the back. Both a youth organisation and

stormtroopers were also a visible part of the German Nazis, and a youth organisation

was also part of the 4th of August regime of Metaxas.

262 Dalakoglou 2013; Eva Cossé, ‘Xenios Zeus: hard times in Greece’, Open Democracy, 2013;

Human Rights Watch, Unwelcome Guests, Human Rights Watch, 2013. 263 E Kathimerini, ‘Documents found at Golden Dawn MP’s home detail rigid hierarchy’, E

Kathimerini, 10.04.2014. 264 ibid.

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Symbols and symbolism

The name of the party should also be discussed. The name Golden Dawn creates an

image of the rising sun, both a symbol of new beginnings – Golden Dawn refers to

itself as a new (and better) alternative to the existing system – and of eternity – the sun

will always rise. Also, if something is golden it is considered pure, and so the party

name can be interpreted as a symbol of a pure new start, free from the decadence of

the previous society. Once again we are reminded of the palingenetic aspect of fascist

ideology (see Chapter 2). I will get back to this in Chapter 7.

XA not only glorifies the past in words, but also by tactical use of symbols. The

emblem of Golden Dawn is often referred to as a symbol that is either similar to or a

modified version of the swastika.265 In reality, the symbol is called the meandros and

it is also known as the Greek key in archaeological circles. A meander means a turn or

wind in a stream, and the name originates from the river Maiandros in Asia Minor. It

can also refer to a labyrinth, a common symbol in Minoan culture. The meandros is

used in the official party flag, often depicted in black on a bright red background (see

Figure 1). The use of symbols can be a powerful way of spreading one’s message to

an external audience. The symbols in use should be rather simple, but yet again

unique, so that people easily recognise them on the street. An example is the sticker

found on a bus shed near Mytilini in the Greek island of Lesvos (Figure 1). The

message is easy enough – the name of the party in capital letters above the meander,

and below it announces that this is a local branch of the organisation, located on the

island. All is written in red on a black background, making it easy to spot at a long

distance.

265 See for instance Anthony Faiola, ‘In Greece, a low-grade street war brews with neo-Nazi

Golden Dawn party’, The Washington Post, 03.02.2014.

93

Figure 1: A sticker from a bus stop in Lesvos showing the symbol of Golden Dawn. Photo: Author.

The meandros serves both as a symbol and a reminder of the ancient roots of the

Greeks, as well as being a reminder of the Nazis. It should be mentioned that the

swastika is not an unfamiliar symbol for XA; pictures from a conference in 1990 show

the congress hall decorated with swastika flags.266

Like the party name, the meandros – and also the swastika – can be interpreted as

symbols of eternity, similar to the circle and the sun. The use of the old sun cross, or

the Celtic cross (Figure 2), further strengthens the metaphor of eternity. This type of

crosses has been used in old fascist movements, like the Nazi party of Norway before

and during the Second World War, and was also used in the symbol for Metaxas’ 4th

of August Regime (Figure 3).

In 2012, Michaloliakos was filmed using the Nazi salute in the Athens city council.267

In his defence he reportedly said that the salute was not the one usually connected

with Adolf Hitler, but rather a version of the old Graeco-Roman Salute. Once again

we are reminded of Metaxas, as the salute was also used by his youth organisation in

the late 1930s. Michaloliakos did, however, later confirm that it was indeed a

266 Bistis 2013. 267 The incident was filmed and can be found on YouTube:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNoRUbkuZ-c [23.04.2014]; Dina Kyriakidou, ‘Special Report: Greece’s far-right part goes on the offensive’, Reuters, 12.11.2012; Michaloliakos admits the use of thee Nazi salute: www.keeptalkinggreece.com/2012/10/21/golden-dawn-chief-admits-his-party-uses-nazi-salute-and-demonstrates-it-with-a-gesture/

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reference to the Nazis, and the media have later gotten hold of footage picturing

prominent members of XA doing the same Nazi salute.268

Figure 2: A typical sun cross/Celtic cross.

Figure 3: The cross as it was used by Metaxa's 4th of August regime.

Figure 4: Black cross on red background. Used by Golden Dawn.269

268 Helena Smith, ‘Golden Dawn photos shock Greece’, The Guardian, 17.01.2014.

95

Solidarity programmes: Helping only Greeks

The Social Solidarity Program of the Golden Dawn includes food and clothing drives,

legal aid, medical exams, a blood bank and lastly a hospitality programme providing

financial aid for those who wish to support and travel to relatives in need of intensive

medical care. Information about the programmes is available in the Golden Dawn

International Newsroom, ‘Your only source for news regarding the Social Nationalist

Movement of the Golden Dawn, in English, free of Western Marxist propaganda.’270

During one of their help programmes, the old Horst-Wessel lied frequently used by

the Nazis was played over the loudspeakers, with new lyrics in Greek.271 The song,

which is also known as ‘keep the banner flying’, was played while members of XA

handed out food and clothing to those in need. However, all who wished to receive

help were thoroughly checked by party members to make sure that non-Greeks were

excluded from any benefits. The whole event was filmed and later published both on

the party’s website and the party’s channel on YouTube. The day the party had picked

for their charity event was the 39th anniversary of the fall of the Junta, a day celebrated

as the restoration of democracy. Michaloliakos purportedly commented that they did

not chose this day by coincidence, but rather wished to emphasise that though ‘[the

government] say they are celebrating the return of democracy … they are really

celebrating state thievery, scandals, and treason.’272 Similar events were also reported

in back in 2012.273

269 Source: Tomislav Todorović, www.fotw.net/flags/gr%7Dhrav.html [14.03.2014]. 270 The Golden Dawn International Newsroom, golden-dawn-international-newsroom.blogspot.no

[04.05.2014]. 271 Derek Gatopoulos, ‘Greece’s Golden Dawn Party Plays Nazi Anthem “Keep The Banner

Flying” Outside Central Athens Offices’, The World Post/Huffington Post, 24.07.2013; Umberto Bacchi, ‘Greece’s Golden Dawn Plays Hitler’s Nazi Anthem at Athens Food Handout’, International Business Times, 12.12.2013.

272 ibid. 273 See BBC, ‘Golden Dawn nationalists hand out “Greeks only” food’, BBC, 01.08.2012.

96

Electoral support Some have said that they vote for XA to ‘punish’ the politicians they believe have led

Greece into the crisis.274 The party is seen as trustworthy, in contrast to leading

politicians. A woman interviewed by Daniel Trilling for an article published in New

Statesman in December 2012 explains:

They say to you, ‘I am the devil’, and they are the devils. I prefer someone that says the truth

and says to me, ‘You know what, I am the bad guy,’ rather than another one that says to me,

‘I am the good guy and I will save you.’275

Her view is not unique. A survey done by Metron Analysis shows that the desire to

punish mainstream parties was the motive for up to 40 per cent of Golden Dawn

voters, whilst being the motive for only 14 per cent of the entire electorate.276 Forms

of political protest have previously taken the shape of support for the extreme sides to

both the right and the left in Greek politics. It is worth noting that the increase in

support for SYRIZA after the financial crisis may also have contributed to a rise in

support for the right, as the Greek people seem just as scared of the left as they are of

the right. People are scared when something exceeds what is considered ‘normal’, and

so in the end, as I mentioned in Chapter 2, when something has become extreme, it

does not matter on which side it originates.

The question that still remains to be answered is how XA manages to have a stable

percentage of support, according to the opinion polls, despite the party’s extreme

ideology? It may seem that the Greek people in desperation choose to ignore the

extreme positions, and instead focused on the party’s will to change the society. The

saying ‘extreme times calls for extreme measures’ comes to mind. XA is not only seen

as trustworthy, but also as the only party that is able to do what others, like the

274 See Trilling ‘A warning from Athens …’. 275 ibid. 276 Georgiadou 2013.

97

governing politicians, dare not.277 The sudden increase in support for Golden Dawn

suggests that the Greek people were looking for change. The parliamentary elections

of 2012 may support such a claim. Increased unemployment, especially amongst the

younger population, had contributed to an increase of the tension between the

populace and the government.

The earthquake election of May 2012 could at the time be interpreted as a onetime

phenomenon, but the fact that XA maintained a stable percentage in the June elections

just a few weeks later refutes any such claims. The previously mentioned survey by

Metron Analysis also shows the earlier political preferences for voters of XA.278 In

May, 33.9 per cent had previously voted for ND, 23.3 per cent for PASOK and 12.3

per cent for LAOS. There was also a significant percentage, 20.9 per cent, of the vote

that came from new voters. In June, 64 per cent of those who voted had also voted for

XA in May. This suggests that a significant amount of the votes actually came from

people who had not voted for the party in May, but changed their minds during the six

intervening weeks. It is also interesting to note that the electoral basis drew on a

variety of other political parties, not only on the right, but also on the left of the

political spectrum.

As for the demographics of the voters, a total of 76 per cent of those who voted for

XA were men, whereas only 24 per cent were women. This is in sharp contrast to the

fact that of the entire sample, only 58 per cent were men and 42 per cent women. They

drew an almost even amount of votes in all age groups from 18 to 54, but less in the

older age groups from 55 to 65 and older. When it comes to levels of education, 58

per cent of those who voted for XA had an intermediate education, meaning that they

had completed high school or technical training. As for the occupation of the workers,

the highest percentage of those who voted for XA were white-collar workers,

employers and independent contractors, unemployed, or public servants.

277 See Wheeler, ‘Europe’s New Fascists’; Trilling, ‘A warning from Athens…’. 278 Georgiadou 2013:92.

98

Younger support

XA has a special appeal in the younger population and was one of the parties that

received the highest share of the young vote in the 2012 elections. In 2012,

MYPLACE279 reported that the violence and the military structure of XA seemed to

impress the young:

[T]here are now school students that salute their friends and even their teachers using the

characteristic Nazi salutation, paint swastikas on the school walls and recruit their friends and

fellow students.280

The party was becoming fashionable.281 As part of their solidarity programmes, XA

members have also been known to be active in neighbourhood initiatives, especially in

areas with an increased report of migrant violence. They are there to protect, and there

have been reports of members handing out phone numbers to children, claiming to be

only a phone call away if they need protection on their way home from school.282 The

recruitment of young students is usually done through sports clubs or the Internet.

279 MYPLACE is short for Memory, Youth, Political Legacy And Civic Engagement. It is a

collaborative large-scale project funded by the European Commission. The project investigates how the social participation of young people is shaped by the ‘shadows of totalitarianism and populism in Europe’. For more information, see myplacefp7.wordpress.com [07.05.2014].

280 MYPLACE, ‘Golden Dawn and the Greek Schools: The fascist penetration in Greek society’, MYPLACE FP7, 14.11.2012.

281 Nathalie Savaricas, ‘Greece’s neo-fascists are on the rise... and now they’re going into schools: How Golden Dawn is nurturing the next generation’, The Independent, 02.02.2013.

282 ibid.

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7 The appeal of the extreme right

In Chapter 1 I presented the following research question:

In light of the recent financial crisis, how do modern Greek history and political

tradition, party ideology, and European integration through membership in the

European Union affect the rise of the extreme right party Golden Dawn?

The previous chapters have considered Greek history from 1821 and up until today,

emphasising the developments since the financial crisis of 2008. I have also looked at

the ideology and electoral support of Golden Dawn as well as the organisation in

itself. In this chapter I will discuss some of the factors that have been presented as

possible contributing causes for the increase in support for Golden Dawn. The first

question I wish to answer is whether this increase in support was to be expected

considering the political situation in Greece and the political cleavages that go back to

the 1820s, or if the financial crisis might have been the precipitating cause? The

second is whether the case of Greece can be seen as unique?

History, nationalism and political tradition It is not only in the categorisation of Golden Dawn as either ‘right-wing’, ‘populist’,

‘fascist’, ‘neo-Nazi’ or all of them combined that the party shares a resemblance with

other right-wing and populist movements in general – and German Nazism in

particular. My review of the modern history of Greece has shown the influence

enjoyed by far right parties, especially in the military. Unstable democracies were

frequently replaced by temporary military dictatorships, the regimes of General

Metaxas and the military Junta being the most prominent ones. The pursuit of a

national identity has also been a dominating force, and Greece has been struggling to

find her place at the corner of Europe, bordering two other great continents.

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Yannis Andricopoulos argues that the ‘power base of authoritarianism in Greece has

consistently been the military, acting as an agent for the monarchy and/or the

bourgeoisie, or in its own interests as a power élite.’283 Internal as well as external

forces have taken part in shaping Greek politics throughout the years, and personal

interests have no doubt played a significant role. This can be seen not only in the

frequent occurrence of corruption and clientelism, but also in the almost dynastic

aspects of Greek politics, in which family name is everything and positions at times

seem to be inherited from father to son.

It is this idea of a corrupt political system that Golden Dawn wishes to change. Even

though XA was not established until 1980, I argue that the ideology of the movement

can be traced back to the struggle to create a unified Greek nation from Greece’s

independence in 1821. Greece is a young nation built on the foreign premises of

western powers. Nationalist sentiment is stronger in younger than in older nations, and

foreign involvement only intensifies the wish for complete self-rule. As we have seen,

the history since 1821 is full of examples of foreign interference, first by the choosing

of the first king of Greece, later by the British support of the right’s fight against the

communists during the civil war, and even later by the United States’ support for the

colonels’ regime, a ‘natural’ reaction considering the tensions of the cold war. The

bailout, under the supervision of the Troika, the IMF and the EU, can be – and has

been – interpreted as yet another incident in which foreign powers meddle in official

state affairs. The result has been a people that seem to feel trapped within a society

governed by non-democratic external policies and with little individual opportunity to

actively participate in government policy-making. The fact that many of those who

voted for XA in the last elections said they did so to punish the sitting government

might support this view, especially if one takes into account that XA was seen by

many as the only party willing to do something for the Greek people. XA has thereby

managed to use Greek history to create their own power base, using populist rhetoric

to play on the already strong nationalist sentiments in the population.

283 Androcopoulos 1980:568.

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Xenophobia and anti-Immigration:

The hesitant police response ‘The murder that awakened Greece’ was the headline in an article published by Ola

Storeng in the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten on the 1st of October 2013.284 The

murder of Pavlos Fyssas had led to a sudden, but massive reaction from the police.

The media saw it as a long-awaited response that strengthened the sitting government.

The question that still remained to be answered at the time was: Why had the

government waited so long to take action? According to Storeng there were

indications that as many as half the police force in Greece had voted for XA in the

previous year’s elections. A poll conducted by Public Issue in September 2013

showed that the support for XA at the time had reached 13 per cent, though it should

be taken into account that the poll was conducted before the murder of Pavlos Fyssas

later that month. 285 Nevertheless, a new survey, this time asking questions related to

the recent arrest of Michaloliakos in October, showed that 14 per cent of the

population disagreed with his pre-trial detention. When asked about the arrest of three

other prominent members of XA, 27 per cent agreed with their release on bail.286 The

results do not give us an accurate percentage of the support of Golden Dawn in the

general population after the arrests in late September 2013; however, they do provide

us with a rough estimate, and it is not unthinkable that people might have responded

negatively because it was a sudden mass arrest of democratically elected members of

parliament. In that way it might support the view of the Huffington Post stated above,

and it might also explain why the police had seemed so hesitant to react when Golden

Dawn members patrolled the streets, dressed in black and beating up what they

presumed to be illegal immigrants.

284 See Ola Storeng, ‘Drapet som vekket Hellas’, Aftenposten, 01.10.2013. 285 Public Issue, ‘Political Barometer 123 – September 2013’, 12.09.2013. 286 Public Issue, ‘Greek public opinion on the issue of Golden Dawn and the role of television’,

15.10.2013.

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There is another explanation. Just before the murder of Fyssas, the sitting minister of

public security, Nikos Dendias, had assembled information regarding 32 incidents in

which the police had refused to respond to violent acts, most of them related to XA

member activities.287 Prime Minister Samaras gave Dendias permission to fire police

chiefs, and an internal investigation began to look at these 32 violent incidents. The

violence within the police is confirmed in a report launched by Amnesty International

in March 2014. When asked about the report, Jezercan Tigani in Amnesty

International says: ‘Our research has shown that the rise of Golden Dawn is only the

tip of the iceberg.’288 The report uncovered a variety of incidents of severe racism and

excessive use of force within the police force. Another surprising turn of events was

made public in early April 2014 when The Guardian could report that Prime Minister

Samaras was facing possible resignation after his chief of staff had been caught on

tape saying that Samaras had instigated the prosecution of XA for political gain.289

Again we are reminded of the tendency towards a corrupt political elite becoming a

premise in Greek politics, as was also mentioned in the previous section.

The ideology and symbolism of Golden Dawn The Guardian frequently uses the terms far right as well as neo-Nazi when referring to

the XA. Others state that they are fascist. The Manifesto emphasise nationalism and

the ‘Nationalist Worldview’, but what exactly does this imply? It should be

unnecessary to say that Nazism and nationalism is not the same thing. Yet for Golden

Dawn this is of some importance, as they are frequently referred to as both. Similarly,

fascism is not the same as Nazism, though it can be the other way around. Members of

XA deny any accusations of Nazism and the Programme states that:

287 Storeng, ‘Drapet som vekket Hellas’. 288 Jezercan Tigani in Amnesty International, quoted in Karoline Kvellestad Isaksen, ‘Rapport:

Gresk politi frir til høyreekstreme’, NRK, 03.04.2014, my translation; see also Amnesty International, A law unto themselves: A culture of abuse and impunity in the Greek police, Amnesty International, EUR 25/005/2014, 03.04.2014.

289 Helena Smith, ‘Greek prime minister facing resignations calls after aide’s gaffe’, The Guardian, 03.04.2014.

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The Golden Dawn is a purely Greek political phenomenon. Nothing to do with other countries

and historical periods [sic]. It is the People's Nationalist Movement, the success of which will

make a difference for our survival as a Nation-State.290

Despite denials, known members of XA have stated being supporters of both Adolf

Hitler and the ideas of Nazism. The same pertains to the symbolism of the party’s

exterior, as has been discussed above. Whether one interprets the symbols and

ideology of Golden Dawn as fascist statements and reminders of Nazism or as strictly

nationalist sentiments and reminders of the old Hellenes is up to each individual. In

that way the symbolism of XA is more implicit rather than explicit, and those who

vote for them may see what they wish to see and ignore the rest. Thus it is mainly

those who are aware of traditional fascist symbols that will recognise the use of the

Horst-Wessel lied or the idea of a party symbol referring to eternity. Nevertheless, in

an article published by The Independent in February 2013, professor at Panteion

University, Vassiliki Georgiadou, who has studied Golden Dawn for years, comments:

‘[…] They use ancient Greek history as a camouflage to hide their true identity: that

they’re fans of Hitler, anti-Semitism.’291 This was again confirmed in 60 minutes’

interview with XA Member of Parliament Ilias Panagiotaros, which was referred to in

Chapter 6.

Despite being inspired by earlier fascist and authoritarian movements, both in Greece

and in Europe, XA wishes to represent something new. Vangelis Lagos in MYPLACE

has been part of a team of researchers doing extensive analyses of all available

documents by Golden Dawn, including those of associated organisations. He claims

that XA is a revolutionary, totalitarian ultra-nationalist organisation with the goal of

salvaging the nation. XA see a nation in peril that can only be salvaged by destroying

the whole previous political and social history of the nation. Lagos adds that XA

rejects and denounces any notion of human or individual rights as well as all forms of

democracy. Everything must be destroyed in order for a new nation to be born out of

290 Golden Dawn International Newsroom, ‘The Program of the Golden Dawn’. 291 Savaricas, ‘Greece’s neo-fascists are on the rise...’.

104

the ashes. Again we are reminded of the palingenetic aspect of fascism, as I will get

back to shortly.

The financial crisis and the bailout It is striking that Golden Dawn as a movement, as well as the surrounding events upon

which it has built its popularity, share similarities with earlier as well as contemporary

movements. Nevertheless, Greece was not the only country struck by the crisis. In fact

the crisis was probably just as deep in other similar South European countries such as

Spain, Portugal and Italy, with unemployment levels skyrocketing as the crisis

deepened. Despite this, these countries have not seen an increase in right-wing

extremism. Instead they have seen other forms of political protest, such as separatism

and far left mobilisation in Spain, and general populism with Beppe Grillo’s

Movimento 5 Stelle in Italy. Even so, the rise in support for right-wing movements is

not a phenomenon that can be isolated to Greece; there has in fact been a right-wing

upsurge in many European countries in recent years. Other studies have shown that in

June 2011, populist radical parties were represented in national parliaments in twelve

of the then twenty-seven member states of the EU.292 This included Greece, with

LAOS representing the radical right with an electoral result of 5.6 per cent at the time.

Many thought LAOS would be the main opponent to ND, but the party moderated

itself and became increasingly mainstream.293 As part of the tripartite government

with ND and PASOK, LAOS also supported the bailout agreement, leaving Golden

Dawn as the only far right party with significant electoral support to oppose the

bailout and the Memoranda. According to Antonis A. Ellinas, this is the first out of

three main reasons for Golden Dawn’s electoral success in 2012. The second is ‘the

failure of the political system to provide alternative forms of political participation’,

which led to ‘the legitimation of and support for political violence as a means to

292 Cas Mudde, ‘Who’s Afraid of the European Radical Right?’ in Dissent, vol. 58, no. 4, 2011. 293 Ellinas 2012.

105

express political dissatisfaction’.294 This might also in part explain why the police

took their time to react to the street violence of XA. The third point is xenophobia.

Eurobarometer polls show that Greeks are more apprehensive than other Europeans,

and Greek public opinion has also viewed increased immigration with some

scepticism.295

According to journalist Jamie Bartlett, the support for the far right is a general

tendency that can be traced back at least twenty years, and is therefore not a direct

consequence of the financial crisis. He builds his argument on the following: First of

all, many known far right parties in Europe saw a decrease in support directly after the

crisis, and those who increased their support were parties in more prosperous

countries which experienced a smaller effect of the crisis. Second, the far right parties

in general ‘cite immigration, a lack of integration by minorities, and national identity

being under threat as their motivating force.’296

It is not economics and austerity that increase the support of the far right, neither is it

culture. Instead, the one thing all far right parties have in common is their opposition

to the present political system. In the case of Greece, however, I argue that it is a

combination of all the above-mentioned factors. The scepticism towards, and collapse

of trust in, leading politicians, political parties and the system in general, are the

underlying causes for their increased support, but economics and the austerity

measures, directly related to the financial crisis, are the precipitating causes. The crisis

and the austerity measures are seen as proof of the faults of the political system and

have further strengthened the far right’s call for change. And so the popularity of

Golden Dawn might, in the words of the Huffington Post, have been a ‘symptom of

the alienation and hardship that their society is experiencing.’297

294 ibid., 15. 295 Eurobarometer 2003; 2009; Ellinas 2012; HRW 2012. 296 Jamie Bartlett, ‘Does Culture or Economics Motivate the Far-Right? Neither’, Huffington Post,

19.12.2012. 297 Associated Press, ‘Golden Dawn, Greek Far Right Party, Returns To Parliament’, The World

Post/Huffington Post, 17.06.2012.

106

Vangelis Lagos confirms this. In contrast to my suggestion that the results of the

elections in 2012 was a protest vote mainly motivated by a need for change and a wish

to punish the sitting government, Lagos believes the votes were cast out of ideological

conviction.298 There are three things that might support his argument. First, the stable

percentage from the May to the June elections do not bear witness to a one-time

protest vote, but rather suggest a wish for long-term change. Second, if the votes were

cast in an anti-austerity protest, the other anti-austerity parties should also have gained

a higher percentage of the vote. Third, ever since the 1990s, nationalism and

xenophobia have been prominent features not only in politics, but also in the general

population, and a vote for Golden Dawn could therefore be perceived as an extension

of the nationalist sentiment already present in the population. If Lagos is correct, XA

is an example of a party that has been able to use populist rhetoric to turn a significant

percentage of the population in their favour. What is even more significant is how the

party has maintained a stable level of support throughout the financial crisis, despite

the many crises within the party.

Golden Dawn: A step further to the right? The purpose of Roger Griffin’s work towards a generic definition of fascism was to

create a concept broad enough to include a wide range of previously categorised

fascist movements, whilst narrow enough to exclude enough movements to keep the

concept from becoming too general. His definition includes the words ‘populist’,

‘nationalism’ and ‘palingenetic’. This is similar to my use of the concepts as presented

in my theoretical framework. I proceed to go a step further in using the generic

definition as one of the principles crucial to defining extreme right-wing movements

like Golden Dawn.

298 Radio Bubble, ‘rbnews international show 20 April 2013: The anatomy of the Golden Dawn

vote’, 20.04.2013.

107

How, then, does Golden Dawn fit the generic definition? Here one should be mindful

of the difference between a movement, a party and a regime. In my opinion XA is

both a movement and a party – or more precisely; it is first and foremost a movement,

and second a movement that has participated in elections as a party. As for a regime, it

is not until a party has come to power that one can witness how it will use its power to

govern. In the case of XA, that has not yet happened, and it is therefore mainly as a

movement that XA will be analysed.

Golden Dawn is a populist movement. Chapter 2 considered two different

interpretations of populism. The first, represented by Cas Mudde, created a social

cleavage between the people and the elite – in the case of Greece represented at first

by the military and later by the politicians. It is a populist belief that politics should

then be expressed through the volonté general, not for the benefit of the elite, thereby

reminding us of the democratic aspect of populism. This is in line with the second

interpretation of populism represented by Margaret Canovan and Anthony Painter.

Golden Dawn is based on ‘people power’, in line with Griffin’s definition of

‘populist’. As a party, both the Manifesto and the Programme speak of the importance

of the people and how they will be included in every important decision if XA ever

comes to power. As a movement, XA resembles a leader cult more than a ‘people’s

association’; with a hierarchic structure, the leader on the top is the one making the

calls, and in theory, what the leader says is law. In practice, Golden Dawn has several

leadership figures, and though they may have to answer to Michaloliakos, they seem

to be allowed to speak freely. It does not seem that the fact that Michaloliakos has

been imprisoned since September has significantly weakened the party, though it

should be mentioned that the withdrawal of Chrysovalantis Alexopoulos as one of

XA’s members of parliament (see Chapter 5), may have been an example of a slight

wither. At the same time, as a response to the investigations against the party and in

the case of a ban from national politics, Golden Dawn has announced the

108

establishment of a new party: the National Dawn.299 This does not look like a

movement in panic or in decay, but rather a movement that intend to weather this

crisis.

Golden Dawn is nationalist. It fits Griffin’s definition of ultra-nationalism as a part of

his generic definition understood as ‘forms of nationalism which “go beyond”, and

hence reject, anything compatible with liberal institutions or with the tradition of

Enlightenment humanism which underpins them.’300 As we have seen, nationalism

has also been important in shaping the history and development of modern Greece.

Anthony D. Smith’s idea of nationalism as attempts to unify a people and identify

those who do not belong is also highly relevant in the case of XA – especially if one is

to believe the polls and the media reports that suggest that XA’s promise of a vendetta

against illegal immigrants may in part have been the reason for their electoral success

in 2012.

Golden Dawn is fascist. Not only in their resemblance to other fascist movements,

their use of symbols and exultation of earlier dictators, such as Hitler and Metaxas

(and Stalin!301), or in their more extreme viewpoints as presented in speeches,

interviews and official documents, but also according to Payne’s typological

description and Griffin’s later generic definition of fascism. However, two of the main

features of fascism as well as the extreme right are revolution and anti-democracy. I

do not think these features fully apply to the case of XA.

Though anti-democracy can be defined in many ways, the simplest definition is that

one opposes the ruling system. In that way, anti-democracy and revolution are highly

related concepts. Nevertheless, it is possible to be anti-democratic without wanting a

revolution. XA also explicitly says that they wish to overthrow the existing

government. However, though XA both in their ideological documents, such as the

299 Smith, ‘Golden Dawn to form new party if banned from polls’. 300 Griffin 1994[1991]:37. 301 Langdon, ‘Greek Tragedy: The rise of Europe’s neo-Nazis’.

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Programme and the Manifesto, as well as in verbal statements from their main leaders

and members of parliament, are unsparing in their critique of the ruling politicians

during the Metapolitefsi, they are not extreme in the sense that they seem to want to

oust the government by force. Instead they emphasise that ‘Golden Dawn's objective

is to overthrow the corrupt governance system of the Metapolitefsi era, through the

democratic procedure’ by obtaining ‘[an] absolute majority in the Parliament.’302

My discussion on the difference between the radical and the extreme (Chapter 2)

should be kept in mind here. Anti-democracy and revolutionary ideas are one of the

main differences between the radical and the extreme. Arguably, it is easier to ban an

extreme party than a more moderate radical party, since only the former is a real threat

to existing society and the political system. The fact that XA uses milder formulations

in their ideological documents than in their rhetoric could therefore be interpreted as a

tactical approach. Even so, it could be beneficial to distinguish between the party and

the movement. The party is clearly defined through the Manifesto and the

Programme, and the movement is defined by XA’s actions and the rhetoric used by

the leaders. And so I have established that XA in general can be seen as nationalist,

fascist and populist, but is it extreme as well? This is where the division is important.

The question is not whether or not the party can be considered as belonging to the far

right, but whether or not it can be categorised as extreme. Consequently, I place

Golden Dawn as a party within Anders Widfeldt’s group 4 (see Chapter 2) and

categorise it as a ‘neo-populist radical right-wing party’. It is neo-populist due to its

pursuit and use of the volonté general, as defined by Cas Mudde. It is radical and not

extreme due to its ideological core, and the documents citing the wish for a peaceful

revolution through the existing system. Even so, I argue that the movement should be

categorised as belonging to the extreme right, not only due to the use of violence

displayed by prominent party members, but also due to the frequent xenophobic

references evidenced in their ideological documents.

302 Golden Dawn International Newsroom, ‘The Program of the Golden Dawn’, my emphasis.

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As I have demonstrated, fascism is a central component of extreme right movements.

This is also relevant in the case of Golden Dawn. However, XA is also illustrative of

the relation between nationalism, National Socialism and fascism, and so I argue that

nationalism, often through a national socialist interpretation, is the foundation for XA

as a fascist extreme right movement. The question that remains to be answered, then,

is whether or not the case of Golden Dawn is a general case, i.e., can it demonstrate

something beyond the case at hand?

Beyond the Greek borders: What can we learn from the case of Golden

Dawn?

In Chapter 1 I briefly introduced a study done by de Bromhead et al. on the growth of

political extremism in Germany in the late 1920s and 1930s. They isolated the

explanations into five broad categories, namely economic factors, social cleavages,

external influence, electoral systems and institutional/cultural inheritances. I argue

that these explanations are applicable in the case of extremism in Greece as well,

thereby strengthening the generalisability of the study done by de Bromhead et al. I

will shortly elaborate.

The economy is an integrated part of any modern society, and it is therefore highly

vulnerable to external influences. In the case of Greece, the integration with the

common market and the euro area made it impossible for the country to devalue its

currency when the financial crisis struck. The admission, in 2004, of having ‘fudged’

the convergence criteria further deepened the crisis in an already unstable economy.

The crisis must also be seen in the context of a tradition of corruption and clientelism

that had existed both prior to and throughout the Metapolitefsi era, which calls to mind

the fifth point of de Bromhead et al. As for the second explanation I have argued that

cleavages have been an important part in shaping Greek politics and society,

especially in the 20th century. I have often referred to these cleavages as political

cleavages, though they have at times been socially or religiously motivated.

111

There has been a custom to use the electoral system in Greece to the advantage of the

sitting parties in government. Though the system in itself has not been used to benefit

the far right per se, it has instead been common to abolish it altogether and establish

dictatorships, such as in the case of the 4th of August regime and the military Junta. As

for external influence, this has been the case both now and in the past. As a curiosity,

it may be worth mentioning that in most cases of political turmoil in Greece, external

forces have interfered. This was the case during the establishment of the first kingdom

in the 1820s, the regime of Metaxas in the late 1930s, the civil war in the late 1940s,

as well as after the Junta and the inclusion of Greece in the EU in 1981. In conclusion,

all five categories can also be found in the case of recent far right mobilisation in

Greece, thereby strengthening my argument that the financial crisis might in fact have

been the precipitating cause for the rise of Golden Dawn.

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8 Conclusion

To see whether or not the financial crisis may have been the precipitating cause for the

rise in support for Golden Dawn, one needs to understand Greece both in the past and

in the present. One needs to understand the condition of Greece at the time of the

crisis, and how such events may have influenced the opinion of the populace. In this

thesis my argument stretches from 1821 until today. This is a long period of time, and

I have not covered every single event in this period. Instead I have tried to focus on

politics and especially the elections. Election results may give a lot of information on

people’s opinions, and of their anxieties, especially at times of crisis. And modern

Greece has seen many crises. From the War of Independence and the unstable years of

nation-building that followed, through the 4th of August regime of the 1930s, the civil

war of the early 1950s and the regime of the Junta between 1967 and 1974, and up to

the latest crisis, the financial crisis. The latest is set in a time at which the increase in

the inflow of immigrants has, according to some, taken its toll on an unbalanced and

unstable economy – at time when a single Greek farmer on Lesvos seems insignificant

amidst the whole system that is the European Union.

My account of the history of modern Greece has shown that there is a Greek tradition

of leaning on far right parties at times of crisis. Now, an increase in unemployment

has seen a rise in the support for extreme parties both to the left and to the right,

especially amongst the younger population. The far right is again an alternative to the

existing political system and the regime of the left and centrist parties. As the financial

crisis progressed, the EU seemed hesitant to come to Greece’s rescue, and people took

to the streets in large demonstrations. Most of the time, the riots were peaceful, but

some featured groups of unemployed men questioning the authority of the police, with

violent results. Suicide rates and unemployment rates increased as the crisis

continued, and so did the support for the far right parties.

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‘Has Greece’s economy finally turned a corner?’ asked the BBC on the 11th of

December 2013.303 If they are correct and I am correct, my thesis will have shown that

support for Golden Dawn will drop; however, it is unlikely that politics will again be

balanced between ND and PASOK. Political cleavages linger for a long time in

Greece, and discontentment with the existing political system does not disappear over

the night. Nevertheless, the developments in Greek politics since the turn of the new

millennium does suggest a wish for change that should not easily be brushed aside.

Neither should the sudden blossoming in support for the far left party SYRIZA.

As both local and European elections approach, the far right is mobilising across

Europe, and it will be interesting to see whether the imprisoned Michaloliakos will

retain his seat on the Athens city council, and whether the far right in Greece will keep

their two members of the European Parliament, either through LAOS or XA.

Greece is a country of extremes. The project of nation building, the Megali Idea, and

the deep cleavages between royalists and republicans, and later communists and the

far right created a sentiment given to political extremes – at either end of the spectrum

– that is still present today. As a country of extremes, it rarely manages to stabilise

something in between, instead creating systems of extreme opposites. It may therefore

seem fitting (or frightening) that the Greek national motto is ‘Ελευθερία ή Θάνατος’

(Elefthería í thánatos), ‘liberty or death’.

303 Mark Lowen, ‘Has Greece’s economy finally turned a corner?’

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Appendix

The Manifesto of Golden Dawn304

304 Source: xaameriki.wordpress.com/2012/11/01/the-manifesto-of-golden-dawn-for-the-

communists-who-lie-and-claim-we-have-no-ideology/ [07.05.2014], original available at www.xryshaygh.com/index.php/kinima [07.05.2014].

1

Our identity Golden Dawn is a Social and Nationalist movement with a structure, principles and positions. It has been active in the political life of the country since the mid-90s, having taken part in EU elections (1994, 2009) and national elections (1996, 2009). On November 7, 2010 the Golden Dawn participated in the municipal elections. In the recent elections of June 17, 2012 it received 7% and elected 18 MPs. The Social Nationalist movement of Golden Dawn is at the front line of the struggle against the suicidal memorandum and the sinful regime of the Parties that form the political establishment. We fight against the alteration of our racial demographics that is conducted by the millions of illegal immigrants, and the dissolution of the Greek society promoted by both the governing parties and the so-called Left. We propose a national strategy so that we can overcome the crisis imposed on our country. We are struggling for a Greece that belongs to the Greeks.

WHAT BEING A GOLDEN DAWNER MEANS 1) I embrace the Third Great Ideology of history, the one that is rooted deeply in the history of my people. Opposed to both internationalist communism and globalist capitalism. 2) I embrace the need for a state founded and built based on this ideology that nourishes and guides continuously our lives as individuals and as a society. A state that constantly serves the eternal revolutionary principles of the Nationalist Worldview, with the ultimate goal of forming a new society and a new type of man.

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3) I embrace the moral imperatives arising from my worldview and aim to a radical renewal of the obsolete and counterfeit social values. My ideology is not looking to salvage anything from the current economic and social interests that lead nations, peoples and cultures in decline. So I’m an enemy of every power that spreads this disease that finds foothold in the Plutocracy. Whether this power is a military-financial dictatorship or a parliamentary dictatorship. Because those are the two sides of the same coin, and their purpose is to tear down national identity. 4) I am aware that nationalism is the only absolute and true revolution because it seeks the birth of new moral, spiritual, social and mental values. The Right and Left solutions supposedly fighting each other, is just an illusion created by the two partners that perpetuate the dominance of cosmopolitan internationalists, anti-national and anti-social forces. 5) I believe the only state that serves correctly it’s historical role is the Social state, where political power comes from the people, without party promoters. Nationalism sees people not only as a numerical entity of individuals but as a qualitative synthesis of people with the same biological and spiritual heritage, which is the source of all creation and expresses its power in the social state. The only state that can represent the people as an organic and spiritual living entity. 6) The politicians on both the Right and the Left are deliberately lying, because democracy means "rule of the People", of the society that is comprised by people of common origin ( the definition of the Citizen in Classical Athens). The Social State of Nationalism is the only direct democracy. The state where the people are the only reality and do not need authority but leadership. The People are the real sovereign and

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rule themselves through their leader. So the social state can fulfill the only possible equality (that derived from Human Thought and that is not a natural, but a human cultural–political creation), the equality of opportunities. In contrast to the transient and fleeting majority of parliamentary governing, the will of the people is the supreme law, and obedience to it results in true justice.... 7) I realize that in the Social State of the Nationalist Ideology , ultimate equality before the law and politically structured social equality exist. In the Social State there is no social stratification based on income or economic classes. The social classes are organically collaborating groups of people with different abilities and productive skills each, just like in a living organism. The different systems contribute harmonically and in full cooperation for their survival. Solidarity is the rule of the Social State for the relations between social classes. The few people who have burgled their organic relationship with the people are the members of the Plutocratic Oligarchy with their cosmopolitanism, and members of the leading groups of “Bolshevik partisanship-unionist oligarchy” with their internationalism. The oligarchies of money and the political parties are all the same- enemies of the Nation and the People. 8) I am an enemy of the vast and exploitative Capital, either local or international, and a champion of small family ownership like the “kleros” or “temenos” of our ancestors. Money is a mean of necessity, not a governing principle of life or the purpose of it. The ultimate goal of the Social State is the elimination of the false value of money and the controlled use of it as a trading mean. The State should have control over private property so that it won't be abused and won't endanger the survival of the People. The economy should be planned to serve the National policy and to ensure maximum self-sufficiency without dependence on international markets and the control of multinational corporations. 9) I believe that the state, the Social State, is the political expression of the nation and that the nation sprouts from itself, without it being an invention. It is an automatic spiritual event that springs from the existence of the People, it is a reality that is based on the existence of the People. Whether or not the People realize the extent and depth of its existence, the Nation is the highest spiritual entity. The People is born from

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the Race, and its existence gives birth to the Nation as a superior spiritual manifestation (moral, cultural, religious). Derived from the people, the Nation – Race, needs to be strengthened and developed through the state. It may exist without a state but will be steadily declining (See the national rise of the Greeks after 4 centuries of subjugation and the lack of a state). So I understand that international communism and liberal cosmopolitanism are undermining the nation by stirring up class divisions. 10) I believe in the importance of the society, the community of the People, and not that of the individual. The individual becomes a person and forms his shape, his “I” identity within the “We” of the total. Individuals do not have historical significance as opposed to the People who are space-time condensations of qualities of the People and the Nation. An individual can become a person when he socially integrates himself, through his ability, as the harmonious composition of social and individual values. This superior type of human is the new kind of human that nationalism seeks to create. 11) I honor and respect my tradition because it is the sum of beauty and the goodness that occurred and revealed in my People's history. While bound by tradition, I seek the new creation, the incessant evolution. 12) The Social State of Nationalism delivers social equality of opportunities based in meritocracy and does not ignore the Natural law of diversity and difference. Respecting the spiritual, ethnic and racial differences of men we can build a society of social justice and equality before the law. This equality is the proof of the moral transgression of nationalism and shows that there is no legal modulation to protect the naturally existing inequalities that are an integral part of nature and life. On the contrary, the Social–National State gives the same opportunities of enhancement and conservation to everyone of the different elements of every existence. So, as a Nationalist, I fight all forms of destructive "equalizing" policies (of Nations, Races, Men), and any false artificial inequalities and oligarchies (Money, Political Parties, Perversions). ARISTOCRACY IS BORN OUT OF MERITOCRACY, THIS IS WHY I FIGHT AGAINST ALL FORMS OF OLIGARCHY

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